Nebraska House Republicans meet with Trump at Mar-a-Lago

In a gilded dining room at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, Nebraska U.S. Rep. Mike Flood dined on beef and lobster Sunday night and joined a two-hour discussion with the soon-to-be-president on how to pass his agenda in the new Congress.

“I think the consensus was that we need one big, beautiful bill — those were Trump’s words — but that we need to work it through the process as soon as possible,” Flood, who represents Nebraska’s 1st District, said in an interview following the dinner.

Trump has been meeting with numerous Republican groups in recent days over how to pass his plans for more security at the United States-Mexico border, extending his 2017 tax cuts, boosting energy production and making off-setting cuts within the federal budget.

Flood was invited to the Palm Beach, Florida, meeting because he was recently elected vice chairman of the House Mainstream caucus, a group of some 80 self-described “pragmatic” conservative Republican lawmakers. In recent years, Flood said, that caucus has often played a big role in passing legislation in a Congress that is closely divided between the GOP and Democrats.

The challenge is even bigger in this Congress, with Republicans having barely a vote to spare.

“I told him that I’m vice chairman of Main Street, and we’ve got 80 members that are ready to get to work,” Flood said of the conversation he had with Trump before the dinner. “We’re about getting things done.”

Also among the two dozen House Republicans meeting with Trump Sunday night was U.S. Rep. Adrian Smith, Nebraska’s Third District representative in the House, who serves as chairman of the House Ways and Means subcommittee on trade.

Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen was also part of a group of Republican governors who recently met with Trump.

Flood said there was much discussion during the dinner on the need for massive aid to help California recover from devastating wildfires, with Trump repeating his belief that California’s environmental policy has contributed to it.

Flood said he supports the aid but also agrees with Speaker Mike Johnson that there should be a discussion on placing conditions on it. Flood said that includes possibly tying the bipartisan need for aid with other bipartisan needs like passing a budget and raising the nation’s debt ceiling this year.

Flood said he supports extending the Trump tax cuts, without which some Americans would see a 20% bump in their taxes. But given the $4 trillion cost over a decade, Flood said there will have to be corresponding budget cuts found.

“That’s something a lot of us demand,” he said.

Photos: First day of Nebraska’s 2025 legislative session

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