The House voted on Thursday to claw back $9.4 billion that lawmakers had already approved for foreign aid and public broadcasting, as Republicans banded together to codify spending cuts put forward by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
The 214-to-212 vote came after the White House asked Congress to formally approve the rollback, which had largely been enacted by executive order and DOGE. The request was something of a pivot for President Trump and his top officials, who have aggressively challenged Congress’s power of the purse and made clear that they are willing to steer around the legislative branch to try to unilaterally control federal spending.
In this case, though, the administration went through normal channels and asked Congress to go along with its efforts to redirect federal money from programs that have historically drawn substantial bipartisan support. The bulk of the funds targeted — $8.3 billion — is for foreign assistance programs. The remaining $1.1 billion is for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds NPR and PBS.
“America’s resources should always serve America’s interests,” said Representative Warren Davidson, Republican of Ohio. “The reality is the radical left has seized these institutions and wielded them for an agenda that doesn’t serve America’s interests.”
Four House Republicans joined Democrats in opposing the measure, which passed only after Speaker Mike Johnson pressed a handful of G.O.P. lawmakers who had initially voted “no” to support it. Those who broke with their party in opposition were Representatives Mark Amodei of Nevada, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, Nicole Malliotakis of New York and Mike Turner of Ohio.
At least one Republican who initially voted “no” but changed his vote, Representative Nick LaLota of New York, suggested he did so after winning a concession from Mr. Johnson on SALT deductions — state and local taxes that can be written off on federal returns — a key issue in Republicans’ domestic policy bill.
He said he left a conversation with the speaker on the House floor with “expectations that my constituents will get what they need.”
The proposal’s fate in the Senate is unclear. Republicans can approve the clawbacks with a simple majority vote, but some senators have expressed a range of concerns about taking back money from programs they support, including for public broadcasting and the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, the global health program that President George W. Bush started and is credited with saving more than 25 million lives worldwide.
Even in the House, where Republicans tend to skew more conservative than their colleagues in the Senate and defer more to Mr. Trump, several conservatives had openly fretted about taking back the money. On Thursday, minutes before some Republican lawmakers switched their votes, it appeared that the measure would fail.
“Our local stations are dedicated to serving their communities, but their ability to continue offering free, high-quality programming would be eliminated if the federal funding is rescinded,” Mr. Amodei said in the days leading up to the vote. “Rescinding this funding also would isolate rural communities, jeopardizing their access to vital resources they depend on.”
If approved by the Senate, the rollbacks to public broadcasting would affect more than 1,500 public media stations, as well as the corporation’s public radio satellite system, which enables national emergency alerts.
Democrats assailed the package.
“We’re on the floor of the House of Representatives, not debating legislation that is designed to make this country and our economy more affordable, but actually debating legislation that targets Elmo and Big Bird and Daniel Tiger and ‘Sesame Street,’” Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the Democratic leader, said on the House floor, brandishing a small Elmo plushie.
The $9.4 billion package the White House put forward amounts to a minuscule portion of the overall federal funds Congress controls.
But Republicans’ initial reluctance to approve the package, which administration officials had narrowed in an effort to avoid a failed vote, foreshadowed a difficult path ahead for any other spending reductions they might be asked to approve. The last time a Trump administration asked lawmakers to pull back federal funds they had already approved, during Mr. Trump’s first term, the effort failed after two Republican senators joined Democrats to defeat what had been a largely symbolic effort.
White House officials envision the $9.4 billion package as the opening salvo and want to send more cuts for lawmakers to codify.
“It’s very clear that this is an opening shot,” Representative Chip Roy, Republican of Texas, said of the package. “We’ll see if Congress can step up to the plate.”
Megan Mineiro contributed reporting.
Catie Edmondson covers Congress for The Times.
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