Government shutdown: Lawmakers reach agreement on short-term bill

The temporary spending bills generally fund the agencies at current levels, but included an additional $231 million to support the Secret Service and added additional money to replenish a disaster relief fund and to help with the presidential transition, among other things.

Lawmakers have struggled to get to this point as the current budget year ends at the end of the month. At the urging of the most conservative members of his conference, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., tied the temporary funding to a mandate that would have required states to require proof of citizenship when people register to vote.

But Johnson couldn’t get all Republicans on board, even though the party’s presidential nominee, Donald Trump, insisted on the package. Trump said Republican lawmakers should not support a stop-gap measure without a vote requirement, but the bill was defeated anyway, with 14 Republicans opposed.

Bipartisan negotiations began in earnest shortly thereafter, with leadership agreeing to extend funding through mid-December. This gives the current Congress the ability to craft a full-year spending bill after the Nov. 5 election, rather than push that responsibility to the next Congress and president.

In a letter to fellow Republicans, Johnson said the budget measure would be “very narrow, simple” and include “only the extensions that are absolutely necessary.”

“While this is not the solution that any of us prefers, it is the most prudent course of action under the current circumstances,” Johnson wrote. “As history has taught and current polls affirm, shutting down the government less than 40 days after a fateful election would be an act of political malpractice.”

House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said Democrats will evaluate the bill in its entirety before a vote this week, but with the deal, “Congress is now on a bipartisan path to avoid a government shutdown that would would hurt ordinary Americans.”

Rep. Tom Cole, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, said Friday that talks are going well.

“So far, nothing has come up that we can’t handle,” said Cole, R-Okla. “Most people don’t want a government shutdown and they don’t want it to interfere with the election. So no one says, “I have to take this or we’re going.” It’s just not like that.”

Johnson’s earlier effort had no chance in the Democratic-controlled Senate and was opposed by the White House, but it gave the speaker a chance to show Trump and conservatives in his conference that he fought for their request.

The end result—effective government funding on autopilot—was what many predicted. With the election just weeks away, few lawmakers in either party had any appetite for the attitude that often leads to a shutdown.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said the same deal could have been reached two weeks ago, but “Speaker Johnson chose to go the MAGA way and wasted precious time.”

As I’ve said throughout this process, there’s only one way to do it, with bipartisan, bicameral support,” Schumer said.

A bipartisan majority is now expected to push the short-term measure across the finish line this week. Agreement on the short-term measure does not mean that reaching a final spending bill will be easy in December. The election results could also influence political calculations if one party does much better than the other, potentially pushing the fight into early next year.