The Senate is aiming to complete consideration of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Reconciliation 2.0 bill and send it to the House this week, before the one-week Memorial Day recess. The bill's $1 billion for security enhancements around President Trump's proposed White House ballroom was reportedly rejected by the Parliamentarian as currently drafted as being in violation of the Byrd Rule that applies to reconciliation bills in the Senate and may be reworked. The Senate Budget Committee will meet on Wednesday, May 20 to approve the assembled bill and Senate floor consideration will be capped by the vote-a-rama process of unlimited amendment votes.

While House leaders are looking beyond the current measure toward a Reconciliation 3.0 bill over the summer that could provide war funding and perhaps affordability proposals, there has been little insight provided on what tax proposals may be included. It has long been the case that a third reconciliation bill would probably require deep spending cuts to make it through the House, and there is some question over whether it would primarily be a deficit reduction or tax cut bill. Senate Republican leaders also have less resolve for a third bill currently, saying they are focused on the ICE/CBP measure. Still, House members are currently pushing for the follow-on bill.

A May 17 story in The Hill newspaper, "GOP lawmakers battle as conservatives press for third budget reconciliation bill," cited conservatives including Republican Study Committee chair August Pfluger (R-TX), as calling on fellow Republicans to pursue a third bill. "We have to get this done before the August recess," Pfluger said. "It's ambitious. We know the process. We understand as a conference how to come together." The story cited House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington (R-TX), who has advocated for a third measure to follow the "One Big Beautiful Bill Act" (OBBBA/OB3), as expressing an urgency to act. "We're going to have to move quickly," Arrington said. "I think we have 25 legislative days left before August break. We need to have something out of the House by then, at least. So, time is of the essence."

Separately, Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), a Ways and Means member and co-chair of the Problem Solvers Caucus who voted against the OBBBA because of Medicaid cuts and warned against any safety net offsets, suggested on CBS' "Face the Nation" May 17 that affordability concerns deserve greater attention. "Over half of the people in this country live paycheck-to-paycheck. A lot of the things that are being discussed inside the state capitols across America, inside the US Capitol, is not laser focused on that all day, every day … " Fitzpatrick said. "We cannot ignore the fact that half of Americans are stressing over their family budgets. And that's got to drive the legislative agenda."

Schedule — The Senate returns to session today (Monday, May 18) and at 5:30 p.m. is scheduled to hold a roll call vote on confirmation of en bloc nominations provided for under the provisions of S. Res. 690.

The first round of votes in the House this week will include, on the suspension calendar, Rep. Nathaniel Moran's (R-TX) Taxpayer Due Process Enhancement Act (H.R. 6506) addressing collection due process proceedings. There are also Veterans' Affairs and Financial Services committee bills on the schedule.

A House Ways and Means Tax Subcommittee hearing, "Your Paycheck, Returned: How the Working Families Tax Cuts Delivered for Americans," has been scheduled for Wednesday, May 20 at 10 a.m.

The House Energy and Commerce Health Subcommittee will hold a hearing on "Examining the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule, MACRA, and Opportunities for Payment Reforms" on Wednesday, May 20 at 2 p.m.

Highway bill — House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Sam Graves (R-MO) and Ranking Member Rick Larsen (D-WA) on Sunday, May 17 released the text of a bipartisan, five-year surface transportation reauthorization bill — the BUILD America 250 Act — Building Unrivaled Infrastructure and Long-term Development for America's 250th Act — for investments in roads, bridges, transit, rail transportation, and highway and motor carrier safety programs. A markup is expected on Thursday, May 21. EV fees may be a controversial topic as negotiations move to the Senate. A new highway bill is required by September 30.

The last reauthorization was wrapped into the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) (Public Law 117-58, also known as the "Bipartisan Infrastructure Law"), which provided approximately $350 billion for federal highway programs over five years (FY 2022 through 2026) and $118 billion in general fund transfers to the Highway Trust Fund (HTF).

Meanwhile, President Trump and some congressional Republicans last week called for a suspension of the Federal gas tax, with GOP bills introduced to provide a 90-day holiday from the 18.4 cents-per-gallon gasoline and 24.4 cents-per-gallon diesel fuel taxes, as affordability concerns persist ahead of the midterm elections. However, there has been little movement toward acting on the proposal in Congress.

Housing — The House is expected to vote this week on changes to a Senate-passed, bipartisan affordable-housing bill (HR 6644), under suspension of the rules, an expedited process that requires a two-thirds supermajority for passage. The House will vote on an amendment negotiated by Financial Services Committee Chairman French Hill (R-AR) and Ranking Member Maxine Waters (D-CA) that would change the Senate's language restricting large investors' ownership of single-family homes. Those restrictions were added by the Senate at the request of the White House, as part of implementing the President's January executive order 14376, "Stopping Wall Street from Competing with Main Street Homebuyers." Among other changes, the House amendment would drop Senate language requiring large investors who own single-family homes to divest them after seven years. The homebuilding industry and many housing market stakeholders have opposed elements of the large-investor restrictions.

The White House has been urging the House to simply accept the Senate-passed bill, though there appears to be little prospect of that at this point. Punchbowl News reported that the President weighed in on Saturday, posting on social media that Congress should attach the SAVE America Act voter ID bill to the housing bill, along with the contentious reauthorization of FISA surveillance authority.

The House is also restoring the package of community banking deregulatory items that were in the House-passed version of HR 6644, a move that has been criticized by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee. Warren's staff is holding a briefing today (May 18) for other Democratic offices on issues Warren has targeted in the community banking section, such as its easing of regulatory treatment of banks' custodial and reciprocal deposits, as well as easing capital requirements for de novo banks, Punchbowl reported.

Bill introductions — On May 15, House Ways and Means Committee member Terri Sewell (D-AL) introduced the Local Infrastructure Financing Tools Act (LIFT Act, H.R. 8864) to provide a credit for American infrastructure bonds. Similarly, in May 2025, Senators Roger Wicker (R-MS) and Michael Bennet (D-CO) introduced the American Infrastructure Bonds Act to establish a taxable, direct-pay bond program, expanding investment opportunities for infrastructure improvements, to address the fact that many rural communities continue to struggle with high interest rates that delay projects.

Global tax — New today (Monday, May 18), the OECD announced a "common understanding to preserve the administrative and compliance benefits of the central filing mechanism for the GloBE Information Return (GIR)," featuring an agreement to publish a list of jurisdictions expected to have a fully operational GIR filing portal in place by May 31. OECD also released administrative guidance that addresses an unintended gap that arose in instances where an MNE Group with a 52/53-week fiscal year has its UPE located in a jurisdiction that is eligible both for the Transitional UTPR Safe Harbour, and the Side-by-Side (SbS) Safe Harbour or the UPE Safe Harbour for fiscal years starting on or after January 1, 2026.

Elections - Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee Chairman and Finance Committee member Bill Cassidy (R-LA) lost his election primary on Saturday, May 16. Rep. Julia Letlow (R-LA), endorsed by President Trump, and state Treasurer John Fleming advanced to a runoff in the Senate GOP primary on June 27. A May 16 Politico story, "Bill Cassidy loses Senate primary in another major win for Trump," said, "It's a remarkable result: Cassidy is the first senator of either party to lose in a primary since 2012. The two-term senator and chair of the powerful Senate [HELP] Committee failed to even make the runoff, finishing with roughly a quarter of the vote."