Government funding bill clears Congress and heads to Biden, averting a shutdown
- The budget measure approved by Congress President-elect Donald Trump’s demands for a debt limit increase into the new year.
- President Biden, who has played a less public role in the process throughout a turbulent week, is expected to sign the measure into law Saturday.
WASHINGTON — Facing a government shutdown deadline, the Senate rushed through final passage early Saturday of a bipartisan plan that would temporarily fund federal operations and disaster aid, dropping President-elect Donald Trump’s demands for a debt limit increase into the new year.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) had insisted Congress would “meet our obligations” and not allow federal operations to shutter ahead of the winter holidays. But the day’s outcome was uncertain after Trump doubled down on his insistence that a debt ceiling increase be included in any deal — if not, he said in an early morning post, let the closures “start now.”
The House approved Johnson’s new bill overwhelmingly, 366 to 34. The Senate worked into the night to pass it, 85 to 11, just past the deadline. At midnight, the White House said it had ceased shutdown preparations.
“This is a good outcome for the country, ” Johnson said after the House vote, adding he had spoken with Trump and the president-elect “was certainly happy about this outcome, as well.”
President Biden, who has played a less public role in the process throughout a turbulent week, was expected to sign the measure into law Saturday.
“There will be no government shutdown,” Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer said.
It was the third attempt from Johnson, the beleaguered House speaker, to achieve one of the basic requirements of the federal government — keeping it open. And it raised stark questions about whether Johnson will be able to keep his job, in the face of angry GOP colleagues, and work alongside Trump and billionaire ally Elon Musk, who have called the legislative plays this time.
Trump’s last-minute demand was almost an impossible ask, and Johnson had almost no choice but to work around his pressure for a debt ceiling increase. The speaker knew there wouldn’t be enough support within the GOP majority to pass any funding package, since many Republicans prefer to slash the federal government and certainly wouldn’t allow more debt.
Instead, the Republicans, who will have full control of the White House, House and Senate next year, with big plans for tax cuts and other priorities, are showing they must routinely rely on Democrats for the votes needed to keep up with the routine operations of governing.
“So is this a Republican bill or a Democrat bill?” scoffed Musk on social media ahead of the vote.
The new 118-page package would fund the government at current levels through March and adds $100 billion in disaster aid and $10 billion in agricultural assistance to farmers.
With a government shutdown at risk, House Speaker Mike Johnson is fighting to figure out how to meet President-elect Donald Trump’s demands — and keep his job.
Gone is Trump’s demand to lift the debt ceiling, which GOP leaders told lawmakers would be debated as part of their tax and border packages in the new year. Republicans made a so-called handshake agreement to raise the debt limit at that time while also cutting $2.5 trillion in spending over 10 years.
It’s essentially the same deal that flopped the night before in a spectacular setback — opposed by most Democrats and some of the most conservative Republicans — minus Trump’s debt ceiling demand.
Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries was in contact with Johnson, but Democrats were cool to the latest effort after the Republican speaker reneged on their original bipartisan compromise.
“Welcome back to the MAGA swamp,” Jeffries posted.
Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, said it looked as if Musk, an unelected official and the wealthiest man in the world, was calling the shots for Trump and the Republicans.
“Who is in charge?” she asked during the debate.
Still, most Democrats approved the bill’s passage.
Trump, who has not yet been sworn into office, is showing the power and limits of his sway with Congress, as he intervenes and orchestrates affairs from Mar-a-Lago, alongside his billionaire ally Musk, who is heading up the incoming administration’s new Department of Government Efficiency.
“If there is going to be a shutdown of government, let it begin now,” Trump posted early in the morning on social media.
Trump does not fear government shutdowns the way Johnson and the lawmakers see them as political losers that harm the livelihoods of Americans. The incoming Trump administration vows to slash the federal budget and fire thousands of employees. Trump sparked the longest government shutdown in history in his first term at the White House, the monthlong closures over the 2018-19 Christmas holiday and New Year period.
Donald Trump’s second term as president comes with the specter of the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, serving as his political enforcer.
More important for the president-elect is his demand for pushing the thorny debt ceiling debate off the table before he returns to the White House. The federal debt limit expires Jan. 1, and Trump doesn’t want the first months of his new administration saddled with tough negotiations in Congress to lift the nation’s borrowing capacity. It gives Democrats, who will be in the minority next year, leverage.
“Congress must get rid of, or extend out to, perhaps, 2029, the ridiculous Debt Ceiling,” Trump posted — increasing his demand for a now five-year debt limit increase. “Without this, we should never make a deal.”
Trump and Musk unleashed their opposition — and social media army — on the original plan Johnson presented, which was a 1,500-page bipartisan compromise he struck with Democrats that included the disaster aid for hard-hit states but did not address the debt ceiling situation.
A Trump-backed second plan, Thursday’s slimmed-down 116-page bill with his preferred two-year debt limit increase into 2027, failed in a monumental defeat, rejected by most Democrats as an unserious effort — but also by Republicans who refuse to pile on the nation’s red ink.
Mascaro, Amiri and Brown write for the Associated Press. AP writers Kevin Freking, Stephen Groves, Mary Clare Jalonick and Bill Barrow contributed to this report.
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