The speaker had vacillated for days over whether to bring up a measure to avert a shutdown because it lacks the Republican votes to pass. On Friday, he plans to plunge ahead anyway.
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By Catie Edmondson
Reporting from Washington
- Sept. 29, 2023, 10:02 a.m. ET
Speaker Kevin McCarthy on Friday was racing ahead with a long-shot bid to pass legislation that would avert a government shutdown at midnight on Saturday, teeing up a vote on the plan even though it lacked the support from his own party to prevail.
The effort was all but certain to fail given the opposition of at least 10 hard-right Republicans who have said they will not back a stopgap spending bill under any circumstances. But Mr. McCarthy, bracing for political blowback for a government closure, scheduled it anyway in hopes of showing he was trying to avoid the crisis.
In fact, the measure under consideration, which would keep government funding flowing at vastly reduced levels and impose stringent immigration restrictions demanded by conservatives, would not prevent a shutdown even if it could pass the House, because it was considered dead on arrival in the Democratic-controlled Senate.
A defeat on the House floor would be a devastating blow for Mr. McCarthy, whose job is on the line and who has been unable to corral his tiny majority to agree on a measure to head off a meltdown. It was unclear whether he would even be able to muster a majority to bring up the measure, much less to pass it.
After a hastily scheduled early-morning meeting on Friday, the House Rules Committee voted along party lines to approve an emergency measure that would allow the temporary spending patch to come to the floor. A vote on that measure was expected before noon. If it passes, the House would move to a vote on the stopgap spending plan.
If the House is unable to pass any sort of temporary funding measure, it would be in an exceedingly weak position to negotiate with the Senate, which is moving ahead with its own, bipartisan short-term funding plan. That bill would continue spending at current levels for six weeks and provide $6 billion in aid to Ukraine and $6 billion for natural disaster relief at home.
Mr. McCarthy’s allies have defended his strategy as a way to show the public that he tried to keep the government open, but was foiled by a handful of his far-right members.
When asked on Thursday night what he would do if the stopgap funding measure failed on the floor, Mr. McCarthy replied: “Ask me after that — if that happens.”
“I’ve still got time,” he added.
The plan offered by House Republicans would keep the government open for 30 days and impose drastic cuts across the board to government programs, except for funding for veterans, homeland security and disaster response.
It does not include any military or humanitarian aid for Ukraine, and it would direct the homeland security secretary to resume “all activities related to the construction of the border wall” at the southern border that were in place before President Biden took office.
“What we’re doing here today doesn’t get us any closer to avoiding a government shutdown,” said Representative Jim McGovern of Massachusetts, the top Democrat on the Rules Committee. “And in fact, what is really disturbing is it seems that the Republicans are moving farther and farther away from a point where we could actually ever compromise and get something done.”
Catie Edmondson is a reporter in the Washington bureau, covering Congress. More about Catie Edmondson
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Source: nytimes.com
