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Good morning. I'm Playbook co-author Rachel Bade. It's Tuesday, September 12th, and the big story driving the day is, shocker here, in fighting amongst House Republicans over spending issues.

The Republican conference in the House

is set to, or I should probably say, is supposed to be taking up and passing the Defense

Department Appropriations bill this week. That's according to the calendar that they've released

and the planning that they've given their members. And you would think that this would be

an easy bill to pass through the Republican-led House. It's quite conservative, chock full of

red meat issues for the base, including pushing back on what Republicans like to call, quote,

woke Pentagon policies. But here's the problem. They don't actually have the votes right now, or they're not

sure that they do. And the reason is because conservatives are pushing Speaker Kevin McCarthy

to commit to lower funding levels for other appropriations bills, not necessarily the Pentagon

bill that they're considering this week, but others that are set to come to the

floor in the next few days and few months. You would be forgiven for being a little confused about this,

because there's actually been a lot of reporting about how McCarthy has reneged on this agreement

he cut with the White House on spending levels earlier this year. He has already instructed

House Republicans

to mark up appropriations bills at lower levels than they will actually be passed later in the year.

But conservatives actually say that's not good enough. They want to go even lower. And it could

actually come to a head as soon as 3 p.m. today when the House Rules Committee will be voting on a

resolution that will basically govern the process for debating and passing this Pentagon bill.

The Rules Committee has three top conservatives on that panel. And if all three of those conservatives

vote against the rule and committee, that means they won't be able to consider the Pentagon

...