The latest Republican US budget package is about far more than allocating another $95 billion in federal spending. It represents an ambitious attempt to reshape the legislative battlefield itself by using the budget reconciliation process to advance politically contentious priorities that would ordinarily struggle to overcome the Senate’s filibuster.

Defence funding, aid for farmers and election reforms have been bundled into a single measure, signaling that the party intends to make national security, rural America and electoral integrity the defining themes of the coming midterm campaign. Budget reconciliation was created to expedite legislation directly affecting federal revenues and expenditure. It was never designed as a vehicle for sweeping policy changes. Yet successive administrations and congressional majorities have stretched its boundaries, from tax cuts to healthcare reforms.

Republicans are now testing those limits again by attaching funding to measures that would tighten voter registration requirements, including proof of US citizenship, while avoiding the 60-vote threshold that would otherwise make such legislation virtually impossible to pass in a closely divided Senate. Whether this strategy succeeds is far........

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