Thank you very much everybody. Uh, look, we had a great meeting with the president. Uh, you know the, uh, group of conservatives in the office with him all want to support the president's agenda. And we're going to work toward getting that continuing resolution in a form where we can pass it just like we did last week.
To all the people who said, you could never pass that reconciliation bill with only Republican votes, wait until next week. We get -- we get another chance with the -- with the year-long CR. Chip?
Oh, sorry. Had a great meeting with the president and, uh, some of our like-minded conservatives in the Freedom Caucus and out. Uh, there is overwhelming support to back the president's agenda to be able to advance, uh, and be able to give room for Elon Musk and DOGE and give room for Russ Vought at OMB to deliver to the American people.
And, uh, finding and recognizing the cuts that need to occur, identify those, get those in place as we debate appropriations heading into the FY 2026 season. But importantly, freeze spending at current levels. Uh, which is going to be able to make sure that we hold spending in check while we identify those cuts.
Uh, which keep coming out day by day, week by week. We're identifying more waste, fraud and abuse. The absurdity of expenditures like a $32,000 transgender comic book in Peru. The American people are scratching their heads saying what's going on? We'll identify that stuff. Let Elon and Russ do their job, support what the president's agenda is to guarantee that we are able to, uh, reduce spending while making sure we can create the room for economic prosperity that we're doing in the reconciliation plan as Andy Harris just referred to, getting cuts in place, making sure the tax policy is extended and making sure we can deliver for the American people.
So, good meeting, we're ready to advance the ball next week and, uh, move this agenda forward.
Just like my colleagues said, we had a great meeting with the president. And the important thing is, is that the agenda that America voted for is not going to be slowed down. Our colleagues on the other side of the aisle are literally hoping and praying for a shutdown to stop the momentum of what the president's agenda is and what the American agenda is. We had a great conversation with the president about how we're going to keep the ball moving forward.
Like Chip says, make sure that we hold spending flat, keep identifying the waste, fraud and abuse in government and then tee up what's next, which is -- which is reconciliation. So, like the chairman said, we've been told before that we can't do it. We've got the slimmest majority ever and it is the people in the Freedom Caucus that are providing the margin, which gets us to victory and we're prepared to do it again.
We're here to support President Trump's agenda and the only reason that the American people still have hope in Washington DC is because President Trump won in a landslide November 5 and he was delivered a mandate by the American people. And so, we are here to move this forward, to pass the CR, to give them the funding, as my colleagues in the Freedom Caucus have said, uh, to -- to advance his agenda.
We are going to continue with the DOGE, uh -- with the DOGE cuts and continue to identify that waste, fraud, and abuse, the theft of American tax dollars, and protect the interests of the American tax people. And, uh, we're happy and honored to be here with the president. Uh, it was great for him to welcome us, uh, in this conversation to have us a part of that dialog so we can deliver, uh, for America and ensure that we are not doing things the way they've always been done in Washington DC.
Did the president ask you for any money for his immigration agenda? And if so, how much? What would it go for?
So, of course, we talked about the need to, uh, have resources at the border. Uh, Tom Homan is working really hard. I mean, look, we've gotten those numbers down to 200 a day, 6,000 a month. Under President Biden, we we're having 6,000 a day, 10,000 a day. So, we need to make sure they've got the resources necessary for ICE, for beds, uh, to be able to deliver and get on with removals and repatriations while they're carrying out the president's agenda there.
Uh, but obviously, what we're talking about here, and we're talking about the, uh, government funding that's expiring next Friday, all we're talking about, to be very clear, is freezing spending at current levels, uh, for the remainder of this fiscal year because we're already in appropriations seasons for FY 2026. And remember that Congress appropriates, which means we put a ceiling.
Uh, the president can't spend over that number. But the president can use impoundment, use the power of the executive branch as the chief executive to spend what he thinks is appropriate for on behalf of the taxpayer. We believe that. We believe he's got that power. We support that power. We support Russ Vought using that power.
Yes.
So, we want to make sure that we're giving him room to do what the American people ask him to do.
The entire House tax cuts, do you think you are on the same page with the president when it comes to making tax cuts permanent?
We are on the same page with making tax cuts permanent. Were also on the same page with the president of balancing the budget.
Yes.
And do you think that both chambers are on the same page?
Well, they're going to get on the same page. The Senate obviously has their product. We've passed ours out. There's going to be a negotiation and a discussion. There'll probably be some give and take, but we're generally pleased with the -- the direction that it's headed. We'd like it to be a little more speedy, but, uh, you know, we're not the only ones in this -- in this conversation.
And understand the importance of what the House did last week when we passed the budget, which had $2 trillion of spending restraint combined with the tax policy. Obviously we got to go in line with the Senate. The president of the United States in the House chamber last night said that one of his key priorities is balancing the budget of the United States.
To do that, we're going to have to have the Senate work with us, get those spending -- the spending restraint, uh, and put that in combination with the tax policy necessary for the economic growth to also deliver. Remember in our House budget, economic growth was a key part of that, but what was really important was tying the spending restraint to the economic growth to deliver on the tax policy.
[Crosstalk]
In this meeting here today -- You just saw Elon Musk on Capitol Hill meeting with Senators, having lunch with them. So, you reported that he even gave out his personal phone number to some of the Senators there. I'm curious if that has been the case with any of you? I know there's a meeting later this evening, but has Elon Musk directly communicated with y'all specifically?
Well, he will, as you say, he will have a meeting with the House conference this evening, the House Republican Conference, this evening. And look, we're going to find out -- we're going to find out a lot of new things because he's been out there. He's been -- he's been rooting out the fraud, waste and abuse that we all thought was there --
No, knew was there.
We all knew was there.
We knew it was.
-- but nobody had brought it to light. He's brought it to light. We look forward to hearing what he has to say this evening.
And yes. And yes, we've met with Elon and yes, um, we engage with DOGE.
[Crosstalk]
What's that? What's that?
Did President Trump ask you to support the [Inaudible]
Well, he asked it last week in a tweet. So, I'm sure he didn't change his mind before today.
How confident are you, you can avoid the shutdown?
Is what?
Is the entire House Freedom Caucus on the same page with the --
Well, look -- look, we have -- we haven't seen the final -- the final form of the CR --
We haven't seen the text.
In concept, the president has said he needs this for his agenda. We support the president's agenda. So, assuming --
And look at the last post that we had.
-- that's right. I mean, again, uh, to those who said, we could not do it last week, we did it. I think we're going to get there. Are we there yet? Maybe not yet, but we -- but we have six days.
[Crosstalk]
Now -- the question. The speaker has not yet released the text. So, until we see the text and we see what we're talking about with respect to anomalies for defense and for veterans, for all of the things that matter, we've got to read the bill. Shocking. I know that's shocking, that we want to see 72 hours to read a bill, right?
Thank you, everyone.
Thank you guys. Appreciate it.
Thank you. Thank you.
All right.
Are you going to censure Al Green?