WASHINGTON \u2014 Rep. Chip Roy laid out a game plan Tuesday for conservatives to go to war against \u201cthe radical left\u201d if the GOP gains control of the White House and both chambers of Congress in the November elections.<\/p>\n
The Texas Republican and House Freedom Caucus policy director said hard-liners will have to roll over fellow Republicans who want to scale back their agenda because of the 60-vote requirement for most legislation in the Senate.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re going to have to get over the excuse that will be dropped on day 1, which is, Chip, we don\u2019t have 60 in the Senate,\u201d Roy said at a Heritage Foundation event Tuesday. \u201cWe got to plan now driving a steamroller over the weak-kneed individuals in the Congress that will use 60 as the excuse not to fight for you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Heritage billed the event Roy spoke at as \u201cDefunding the Left: The Strategy to Save America.\u201d<\/p>\n
Roy said his priorities in the next Congress are to cut spending to stop funding left-wing policies such as tighter emissions requirements for cars, securing the border and restoring a \u201cpeace through strength model\u201d for the military. He said he wants a \u201cstrong, focused military, sparingly used.\u201d<\/p>\n
Calling it a \u201cthird way,\u2019 Roy said: \u201cIt\u2019s not isolationist and it\u2019s not endless wars.\u201d<\/p>\n
Roy said funding national defense has wrongly been used as an excuse to go along with Democratic spending priorities that conservatives oppose.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe just default to fear and we use the national security and defense complex to run over everything else,\u201d he said. \u201cWe just did it last week with the foreign aid bill,\u201d the $95.3 billion emergency supplemental providing aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan and requiring TikTok\u2019s Chinese owners to sell the app or face a U.S. ban.<\/p>\n
\u201cGetting the defense increase was the leverage and excuse for funding the entire omnibus in the first place without getting the reforms we wanted on any of these other issues,\u201d he said. According to Roy, Republicans tell him when appropriations are being negotiated, \u201cWe just can\u2019t risk defense.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWell if that\u2019s what you do, you\u2019re never going to change the town,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Roy, among a handful of Republicans appointed to the House Rules Committee who have blocked leadership efforts to pass legislation, made no apologies for \u201cbreaking the place.\u201d<\/p>\n