House narrowly adopts GOP budget blueprint for Iran war funding, 216-214

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., arrives in the Capitol on Monday. (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call)

By Aris Folley Posted July 22, 2026 at 6:38pm

The House adopted a GOP-backed budget resolution along party lines Wednesday, taking a critical first step toward passing a $95 billion reconciliation package focused mostly on the Iran war.

The vote on the fiscal 2027 budget blueprint was 216-214, with only two Republicans — Reps. Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Warren Davidson of Ohio — joining all Democrats in opposition. Independent Kevin Kiley of California, a former Republican, also voted against it.

Budget Instructions and Funding Breakdown

The budget resolution would lay out instructions for four House committees — Armed Services, Agriculture, Administration and Intelligence — to draft detailed legislation that House GOP leaders hope to approve when they return in September from a prolonged summer recess.

The instructions would allow for Republicans to provide:

• Up to $73 billion in defense and intelligence funding amid the ongoing war in Iran
• $12 billion in farm aid
• $10 billion geared toward advancing the party's voting ID crackdown

Speaker Johnson's Position

Adoption of the measure, whose fate was in considerable doubt, marks another modest victory for Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., who has struggled throughout this Congress to keep his fractious GOP conference united on major policy items.

Johnson, in a statement hailing the vote, said the budget resolution "puts Congressional Republicans on a path to enacting two fundamentally simple and crucial goals: securing American elections and strengthening our homeland by providing supplemental funding requested by the Administration to support our national defense and protect our nation's food supply."

Senate Resistance

But it remains unclear when — or if — the Senate plans to take up the resolution.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., a longtime skeptic of a third reconciliation package, already threatened to hold the budget resolution hostage as he seeks a bipartisan funding deal to stave off a partial government shutdown this fall.

"It's a possibility that, if necessary, we could pull that budget resolution passed by the House and use it to fund government," Thune said, suggesting the Senate could use the filibuster-proof reconciliation process to fund the government if ongoing spending talks fall apart.

When both chambers return in September, they'll have little more than 10 days of shared legislative time to pass legislation to keep the lights on when the new fiscal year begins Oct. 1.

House Republicans have already passed a bare-bones stopgap bill this week to keep the government funded into early December. But Senate Republicans say they plan to roll out their own plan before leaving for their August recess in two weeks.

Iran War Backlash

Democrats united against the partisan reconciliation plan, saying it would mostly help finance a war in Iran that the American public opposes.

"Today, House Republicans passed yet another budget that puts the American people last," said Pennsylvania Rep. Brendan F. Boyle, D-Pa., the House Budget Committee's top Democrat. "Instead of lowering the cost of groceries, gas, housing, or health care, this budget adds almost $100 billion to the national debt to bankroll the most unpopular war in American history."

And some GOP conservative critics bristled at a plan that would allow for up to $95 billion in new spending without requiring any offsetting cuts to other programs.

In a post on X, Massie, a GOP dissenter, accused his party of abusing the reconciliation process to create "a slush fund for the Iran War, and in the process add $130 billion to our debt. We'll see who's conservative by the roll call vote."

Kiley, who broke with his former party to become an independent, said the plan to boost defense spending amounted to a missed opportunity for Congress to "ass..."