Congress sidesteps shutdown with eleventh-hour budget patch
Benjamin Weiss
WASHINGTON (CN) — Congress survived yet another fiscal near miss Friday night, as lawmakers in both chambers agreed to advance a stopgap budget that extends funding for federal programs through the spring and averted a government shutdown just days before the Christmas holiday.
It was a monumental turnaround in Washington, where the mood was grim Friday morning as lawmakers, staffers and federal employees braced for the possibility that a short-term spending plan — known as a continuing resolution — inked by Congress in September would expire by the end of the day.
The malaise came after House Democrats joined Republicans Thursday night to tank a proposed budget bill which they said had been advanced in a betrayal of bipartisanship.
Leaders from both sides of the aisle had coalesced this week around a continuing resolution that would have tacked on millions of dollars in disaster relief and subsidies for farmers, as well as other programs — but the GOP backed away from their agreement amid pressure from President-elect Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk.
House Republicans’ second proposed stopgap retained the disaster funding and farm aid, but sheared off additional provisions and added language deferring the federal debt limit for two years. The latter was a provision specifically requested by Trump and designed to help him avoid debt ceiling negotiations at the beginning of his second term.
After that measure’s spectacular failure, the GOP and House Speaker Mike Johnson emerged from hours of caucus meetings Friday with effectively the same proposal — except this time striking debt ceiling language.
That version of the continuing resolution, as well as the looming threat of a politically damaging government shutdown, swayed most House Republicans and pulled over nearly every Democrat in the chamber. The bill cleared the lower chamber on an overwhelming 366-34 margin, with every vote in opposition cast by Republicans.
Johnson told reporters following Friday’s vote that he was “grateful” to his House colleagues for passing the bill, which he called a “very important piece of legislation.”
Connecticut Representative Rosa DeLauro, the House’s top Democrat appropriator, slammed Republicans in a statement after the vote, arguing that the caucus had “admitted defeat” and left Democrats to swoop in to keep the government open.
“The American people want and deserve peace and quiet during the holidays — not more noise and chaos from a dysfunctional Congress,” she wrote.
The Senate, meanwhile, similarly passed the continuing resolution on an 85-11 vote, sending it to President Joe Biden’s desk for his signature. Biden has already said that he would sign the legislation.
If made law, the continuing resolution will not only avert a government shutdown but freeze federal funding at current levels until March 14, ideally giving lawmakers enough time to negotiate a raft of full-year spending bills. It remains to be seen whether that will happen under Republican leadership — Congress failed to use the time granted by September’s stopgap to achieve a similar goal.
This week’s budget blitz was only made more difficult for lawmakers by Trump and Musk, who took to social media to disparage the original, bipartisan continuing resolution hours before Congress was slated to begin casting votes.
Musk framed the resolution as “pork,” a term used to describe legislation filled with extraneous programs and policies, and urged Republicans not to back it. He threatened GOP lawmakers who voted for the bill with primary challenges — a sentiment echoed by Trump.
The Tesla CEO and X owner also repeatedly spread misinformation about the bill’s contents on his own social media platform.
Musk’s meddling ultimately led to the collapse of the bipartisan continuing resolution and the mad dash to approve a replacement measure ahead of the shutdown deadline. Musk supported the Republican version of the bill that failed on the House floor Thursday.