The House Rules Committee convened just after 1 a.m. on Wednesday morning, with hundreds of amendments to be debated on the “one big, beautiful” reconciliation bill.
But they were missing the most essential amendment of all, one that would encompass all the changes House Speaker Mike Johnson has promised to factions of his conference in an effort to get holdouts on board with reconciliation.
The manager’s amendment is a catch-all for the changes being negotiated by Johnson with holdouts behind closed doors. Republicans didn’t have this amendment when they entered the middle-of-the-night committee meeting, and still did not have it many hours later, as they still were negotiating details well into the morning.