Far Right Balks as Congress Begins Push to Enact Spending Deal

Congress on Monday began an uphill push to pass a new bipartisan spending agreement into law in time to avoid a partial government shutdown next week, with Speaker Mike Johnson encountering stiff resistance from his far-right flank to the deal he struck with Democrats.

Ultraconservative House Republicans have panned the $1.66 trillion agreement Mr. Johnson made with Senator Chuck Schumer, the New York Democrat and majority leader, saying it is unacceptable.

The agreement essentially hews to the bargain that Congress passed last year to suspend the debt ceiling, which the hard right opposed at the time and had hoped to scale back. It also includes $69 billion in spending that was added as a side deal, money that conservatives sought to block altogether.

“This is a total failure,” the far-right House Freedom Caucus, a group of Republicans who have proved a thorn in the side of a series of G.O.P. speakers, wrote on social media.

“I am a NO to the Johnson Schumer budget deal,” Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, the right-wing Republican from Georgia, wrote on social media. “This $1.6 Trillion dollar budget agreement does nothing to secure the border, stop the invasion, or stop the weaponized government targeting Biden’s political enemies and innocent Americans.”

The backlash from the extreme right underscored anew that Mr. Johnson will most likely have to rely on substantial Democratic support to pass the spending bills underlying the agreement. It also raised questions about the viability of his plan to try to attract Republican backing to spending measures by inserting conservative policy dictates aimed at restricting abortion rights and what Republicans see as “woke” administration policies.