Congress approves funding bill to avoid government shutdown

By Deidre Walsh

Congress voted Wednesday evening to approve a stop-gap spending bill to fund government programs through December 20. The bipartisan spending bill postpones the debate on full year funding levels for federal programs until after the election, and avoids a shutdown. Government agencies run out of money on September 30.

“Our focus now turns exclusively to Nov. 5,” Johnson told reporters after the House vote, referencing Election Day. “Our members are now returning to their districts and they’ll be working in their districts until the election and they will be making their case to the voters.”

The House and Senate both overwhelmingly approved the measure to keep funding levels consistent across most programs through December 20, postponing the broader fight over individual spending bills for federal programs.

The bill also boosts funding for the U.S. Secret Service by $231 million following two assassination attempts on Trump. But that increase comes from shifting some existing accounts, and not from adding to the overall budget level.

Speaker again maneuvers GOP splits on spending

In all, 86 House Republicans opposed the bill, highlighting a persistent divide within the party over how to deal with funding bills in divided government is familiar dynamic that has plagued since the GOP took control of the chamber in the 2022 midterms. Hardliners have insisted on slashing domestic programs and pushing partisan policy riders on spending bills, while lawmakers facing tough reelection bids in competitive districts argue the party needs to show it can govern. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy was the first speaker ousted in history last fall following his decision to work with Democrats on a spending bill to avoid a shutdown. No GOP lawmaker is threatening to oust Johnson over this week’s short term bill.

Texas Republican Chip Roy, a vocal critic of his leadership’s plan to move the stopgap bill, expressed his frustration during Wednesday’s debate, saying Congress was again “kicking the can down the road.”

“The institution has failed, it’s failing to do the one core thing that it’s supposed to figure out how to do,” Roy said, referring to securing the country’s southwest border.

Hours before the vote House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries boasted that for the fifth time Democrats would step in and provide the votes to get the measure through the chamber and avoid any lapse in funding.

“House Democrats have repeatedly governed in the minority as if we were in the majority in order to meet the needs of American people. That is the story of the 118th Congress,” Jeffries told reporters.

House and Senate leaders reached a deal on the bipartisan plan after conservative House Republicans torpedoed Johnson’s six month spending proposal last week that attached a bill that required people to provide provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote. It’s already illegal for non-citizens to vote, but GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump pressed for a House vote on the legislation, and suggested Republicans should shut down the government in order to force Democrats to agree to the measure.

Johnson met with Trump recently and told reporters they discussed the need to pass government funding. He told reporters Tuesday “it would be political malpractice to shut the government down. I think everyone understands that.”

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Wednesday, “I hope the House will have learned its lesson that once again listening to the hard-right on these vital issues to funding the government, to avoiding default, cannot lead to anything that is useful or constructive.”

Congress to face new deadline during lame duck session

The speaker vowed there would be no omnibus spending package in December that wraps together all the spending bills — something Congress regularly resorts to when both chambers fail to agree on the dozen individual funding bills.

House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole said he believes the leaders of the House and Senate panels can cut deals on the various bills during the lame duck session after the election. But he admitted, “a lot depends on who the next president is and what they want to do, and what the distribution of power in Congress is”.