Staring down yet another spending deadline, Speaker Mike Johnson again relied on Democratic votes to push through a six-bill package to fund about half the government through the fall.
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Speaker Mike Johnson, like his predecessor, has been forced to turn to Democrats, a dynamic that he has privately complained has weakened his hand at the negotiating table.
The House on Wednesday passed a $460 billion spending bill to fund about half the federal government through the fall, moving to avert a partial shutdown at the end of the week and offering the first glimmer of resolution to bitter spending fights that have consumed Congress for months.
The 339-to-85 vote capped months of heated negotiations over federal funding that have repeatedly pushed the government to the edge of shutdown as Republicans pressed for cuts and conservative policies. It was yet another instance in which Speaker Mike Johnson was forced to steer around the opposition of the hard right and turn to Democrats to supply the bulk of the votes for critical legislation to keep the government running.
The Senate was expected to take up and pass the bill easily, sending it to President Biden in time for it to become law before a midnight deadline on Friday.
The measure would package together six spending bills, extending funding through Sept. 30 for dozens of federal programs covering agriculture, energy and the environment, transportation, housing, the Justice Department and veterans. Top lawmakers were still negotiating spending bills for the other half of the government over the same period, including for the Pentagon, which Congress must pass by March 22 to avert a lapse in funding.
On Wednesday, Mr. Johnson again relied on Democrats to push the spending legislation across the finish line, after many House Republicans refused to back it because it did not cut spending or accomplish the party’s most sweeping and divisive policy demands, including measures to limit access to abortion.
House Republicans secured some smaller victories, including cuts to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the F.B.I. and environmental programs. Mr. Johnson and his deputies framed the legislative package as a return to standard negotiation over individual spending bills — rather than wrapping them all together into one giant, take-it-or-leave-it bill — and said it was time to move on to the next fiscal year’s spending fight.
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Source: nytimes.com
