House PASSES a short-term funding extension to narrowly avoid a government shutdown Friday
The House of Representatives passed a fourth short-term spending bill to further delay government funding deadlines for the 2024 fiscal year, narrowly avoiding a government shutdown that would have been triggered on Friday.
The final voting result was 320-99. Two Democrats voted against it, as did 97 Republicans.
With new funding deadlines set for March 8 and March 22, the plan now is to pass six appropriations bills to fund each state agency next week, and six the following week.
Next week’s six budget bills are likely to be lumped into a package known as a “minibus,” where they can all only be voted up or down at once.
The remainder of the appropriations are expected to be pooled into one to two minibus votes.
The House of Representatives has passed its third emergency short-term financing bill
Often in recent years, Congress has lumped funding for all twelve government agencies into one package, known as an omnibus.
House Republicans have long set a goal of passing 12 separate bills on individual voting, but now apparently accept the improbability of that.
Still, Johnson celebrated dividing the spending legislation into two to three votes as a victory.
“We are trying to bring the aircraft carrier back to real budgeting and spending reforms. This was important to break it down into smaller pieces,” Johnson said.
The text of the spending bills is expected to be released this weekend, giving lawmakers 72 hours to look at them and decide how to vote on the spending bills.
Congress is now taking its time to approve a spending plan for the 2025 budget year, which begins in October.
The CR vote ends a less-than-24-hour work week in Washington for the House of Representatives, which only returned from a two-week recess on Wednesday evening.
Right-wing Republicans seemed dejected about yet another continuing resolution, or CR, the fourth of this Congress and the third under Johnson.
“I’m returning the nickname for the House of Representatives to the House of Hypocrites,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., told reporters.
“We have our Republicans, who remember the big fight from earlier this year over no CRs and rules, and no omnibuses and no minibuses? All that was talked about at the conference this morning was a CR, a one-week CR, another CR, conservative members of Congress standing up and wanting a one-year CR.”
The House Freedom Caucus had called for a one-year CR because there would be one percent cuts across the board on April 30.
But Johnson told them Thursday morning that this plan does not have broad support in the Republican conference.
“It’s a failure,” Greene said of the new spending plan. “We’re doing everything we said we wouldn’t do.”
“I’m returning the nickname for the House of Representatives to the House of Hypocrites,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., told reporters
Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, predicted this would “probably not” be the last time they would push back funding deadlines to later in the year and continue funding at the level set for 2023 under Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“The voters I’ve spoken to in Texas over the last eight days during early voting are very outraged by what we’re doing in Congress,” Nehls told DailyMail.com.
“If you ask me right now to make a bet in Vegas, I think we’re going to lose the House because of the way we’ve been running this House.”
“Watching Republicans in the House of Representatives is like watching football whose best play is the kick,” Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., said on the House floor. ‘We are once again insisting on the necessary cuts.’
Gaetz ousted former Chairman Kevin McCarthy over his decision to put a CR on the floor months ago, arguing that McCarthy had not kept his word to pass 12 separate appropriations bills.
“Here we are again, shaking things up,” said Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, who supports a full-year CR with one percent cuts. “We will continue to spend money at Nancy Pelosi levels of spending on an omnibus bill that Republicans roundly opposed.”