Cole said last month that the lack of earmarks in that section of the final spending package handicapped House Republicans in fiscal 2024 talks, as they had “nothing to trade back and forth” with the Senate.

Fiscal 2025 process

Cole wants appropriators to get to work quickly on the next set of bills, and said he is waiting for a decision from Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., on the topline spending level.

“He seems to me like a pretty busy guy right now,” said Cole, who defended the Johnson’s job performance and called the speaker “very underestimated.”

While appropriators were unable to move two bills — the Labor-HHS-Education and Commerce-Justice-Science — out of committee last year, Cole said he is confident Republicans can report out all 12 this year. Last year, he said the lack of movement on the House floor discouraged the committee from advancing those last two measures.

“I want to make sure that doesn’t happen again,” he said. “I don’t think it’s hard to move them out of committee.”

However, Cole will have to navigate a panel with four House Freedom Caucus members, enough to block bills from advancing if they so choose.

A self-proclaimed “defense hawk,” Cole said he believes military spending should increase more than the 1 percent allowed under last year’s debt limit law. But he said lawmakers would live within that agreement.

Cole said he wished appropriators and Appropriations Committee staff were in the room during those negotiations last summer, and said the fact that agreement included “side deals” not written into legislative text has complicated appropriators’ fiscal 2025 work.

“The debate is, what is the [debt limit law] level,” he said. “Is it what’s written, does it include side deals, and what are those side deals, and what do they amount to? And there’s disagreement about that.”

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