Sen. Ron Johnson is jumping directly into a legislative train wreck.
The Wisconsin Republican cut his teeth as a fiscal hawk willing to irritate his own party in pursuit of his deficit-shrinking dreams. Now, following Lindsey Graham's death, Johnson is poised to take over the Senate Budget Committee gavel — and **** ume an outsized role in helping shepherd the GOP's current attempt to pass another party-line spending bill.
In theory, the ascension will give Johnson something he's long wanted: a megaphone to promote the agenda of spending restraint he has struggled to make resonate in the rank-and-file.
"I wish Lindsey were alive," Johnson said in an interview. "This is not the way you want to become chairman of the Budget. But set that aside — you know, this is a role that I think I'm pretty well suited for."
His new reality is rocky, however, as he finds himself in the middle of a messy intra-party fight over how to advance a filibuster-skirting reconciliation bill to fund the Iran war and enact parts of the so-called SAVE America Act.