# 2023–24 U.S. House legislative coalition

Beginning in 2023, during the 118th United States Congress, some members of the House Republican Conference and House Democratic Caucus formed an informal legislative coalition to pass major bills in the United States House of Representatives.
While Republicans won a majority of seats during the 2022 United States House of Representatives elections, beginning in June 2023, members of the Republican Freedom Caucus began blocking Republican proposed bills in the House culminating in the removal of Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House in 2023.
Following the eventual election of Mike Johnson as Speaker of the House, Republicans were forced into a coalition with Democrats in order to pass major legislation with Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries playing a powerful role in the chamber. Some reports began describing Jeffries as the de-facto or shadow Speaker of the House.
Such a coalition was highly volatile, without a clearly defined membership, although it always amounted to over two-thirds of House members. In practice, rather than one single continuing coalition, there were several different coalitions between Republicans and Democrats formed on a day-to-day basis depending on the bills voted upon. What led most publications (such as Axios and The Wall Street Journal) to consider this situation different from simple bipartisan votes was its systematic nature: Republican leadership employed it to sideline dissenters and hardliners from their own party on virtually all important, "must-pass" bills.

### September 2024 continuing resolution

In September 2024, Speaker Johnson introduced a continuing resolution which renewed government funding at the previous year's levels for six more months, with a voting reform measure which would have made it compulsory to show proof of citizenship before voting in Federal elections. However, the resolution was voted down by a coalition of 14 conservative Republicans, who opposed the spending cuts, and 206 Democrats, who opposed the citizenship law. Afterwards, Speaker Johnson put forwards a clean three-months continuing resolution, which was opposed by 82 Republicans but supported unanimously by Democrats.

### December 2024 continuing resolution

On December 17, 2024, leadership from the two parties reached an agreement on further short-term government expenditures, unveiling a bill that would have extended the previous continuing resolution's deadline to March 14, 2025, while also funding and renewing several federal programs.
On December 19, President-elect Donald Trump issued a statement demanding the removal of additional spending (except for disaster relief and aid to farmers) and the suspension of the debt ceiling (due to be reached in 2025).
Republicans quickly remodeled the bill to that effect and put it up for a vote, but not to avail: the House rejected the proposal by a vote of 174 to 235, with all but three Democrats joining 38 conservative Republicans, in voting against it. Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries criticized Republicans for abandoning the bipartisan deal at the very last moment. At the same time, conservative Republicans lamented the presence of new spending and the rise in the debt ceiling.
One day after the rejection of the second bill, Republicans released a third remodeled bill essentially the same as the second but without the suspension of the debt ceiling as proposed by Donald Trump. Republicans also announced that has reached a handshake agreement with President-elect Trump to cut $2.5 trillion in government spending in exchange for a $1.5 trillion debt ceiling hike. The agreement was not part of the third proposal and was not voted on by the House.
The bill was passed in a 366–34 vote, with one member voting present. All but one Democrat voted for the bill, while 34 Republicans voted against it.