WASHINGTON — The House voted Tuesday to pass a short-term funding bill and avert a government shutdown at the end of September, keeping money flowing at current levels until Dec. 11.
The legislation, which has already passed the Senate, sailed through the chamber by a vote of 370-48. It now goes to President Donald Trump, who is expected to sign it.
That would take the biggest legislative item off the to-do list for Congress ahead of the elections Nov. 3, punting stalled negotiations over a full-year funding deal until after the midterms.
The two parties have clashed over the scope of federal spending as Democrats reject Trump’s call for a massive $1.5 trillion military budget, a spike from the already record-breaking $1 trillion that Congress gave the military this year.
Funding the government requires 60 Senate votes to defeat a filibuster, meaning it must have bipartisan support even though Republicans control both chambers and the White House.
House Appropriations Committee Chair Tom Cole, R-Okla., accused Democrats of blocking a deal to weaken politically vulnerable Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, who chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee.
“I do want to finish all the bills before the end of the year. Now, whether we can do that or not is another matter,” Cole said, referring to the 12 appropriations bills that fund the government. “We won’t know if we’ll be doing that till after the election.”
The winners of the midterm elections will feel empowered to press their demands in the lame-duck negotiations, knowing that they’ll have more power in the upcoming year.
The election “has a tremendous impact,” Cole said. “We will act like we can come back and things will be exactly the way they were when we left. They won’t be. Everybody’s calculations will change. Everybody’s point of view will change. It’ll have an enormous impact about what happens for the balance of the year.”
Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., said she hopes to become chair of the Appropriations Committee again if Democrats win the House.
But she said her only priority now is to finalize a full government funding deal for the new fiscal year before 2027 begins.
“The midterm election will have an effect, but the goal is that we need to pass appropriations bills before the end of the year. That is a bipartisan view of where we need to go with the committee, and so that’s what we are going to press for,” DeLauro said. “Let’s get to the finish line.”
