House Republicans on Monday advanced a short-term funding bill — opposed by congressional Democrats — that would avert a government shutdown.
The GOP plan to keep the government open through September cleared the House Rules Committee in a 9-3 vote, with every Democrat on the panel voting against it.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has said he plans to bring the measure before the full House floor for final vote on Tuesday.
The bill — a continuing resolution that will essentially extend fiscal 2024 spending levels through the start of the 2026 fiscal year — is backed by President Trump, who was working the phones earlier Monday to convince House GOP holdouts to back the measure.
The continuing resolution must pass the House, Senate and be signed by the 78-year-old president by midnight Friday to keep government operations running without interruption.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), who refuses to back the measure, claims it will impose “the largest cut to Medicaid in American history.”
“They’ve also put a target on the back of Social Security and Medicare,” Jeffries said of his Republican colleagues, accusing them of also targeting cuts for “nutritional assistance for children and families.”
“Republicans are trying to rip health care away from tens of millions of Americans,” he said.
House Republicans have rejected Jeffries’ claims.
“That’s a completely separate issue from discretionary appropriation bills, that’s all mandatory funding,” one senior House GOP aide said on a phone call briefing reporters Saturday.
The aides pointed out that the only cuts included were “side deals” made between former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), former President Joe Biden and then-Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) as part of the Fiscal Responsibility Act in 2023.
Under the measure, defense spending will get a $6 billion boost from fiscal year 2024, but non-defense discretionary spending will fall $13 billion beneath the previous fiscal year.
There’s also no funding for so-called “community projects,” which were earmarks for funding needs in lawmakers’ districts that House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole (R-Okla.) did away with.
“The goal here is to start spending less money,” another senior Republican aide told reporters.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is also getting a slight boost to nearly $10 billion, up from the previous year’s spending level, to carry out Trump’s mass deportations.
The conservative House Freedom Caucus supports the resolution.
“Contrary to Congress’ longtime abuse of this legislative tool, this CR is a paradigm shift,” the caucus said in a statement released after the rules vote Monday.
“This bill will reduce and then freeze spending for the next six months to allow President Trump and his Administration to continue their critical work within the Executive Branch to find and eliminate waste, fraud, and abuse,” the caucus added.
“It entirely kills the prospect of a budget busting, pork-filled omnibus this fiscal year, and it breaks the longstanding practice in the Swamp of handcuffing increases in defense funding with increases to the non-defense bureaucracy,” it said.
“Furthermore, it contains zero earmarks, makes major rescissions to the Internal Revenue Service and the so-called ‘Commerce slush fund,’ and includes additional funding for immigration enforcement and deportation operations. Perhaps most importantly, it prevents Democrats from derailing the America First agenda with a go-nowhere government shutdown.”
Not all GOP members are on board with the measure.
Reps. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) and Cory Mills (R-Fla.) have indicated they are on the fence, and Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) is committed to tanking it.
“Unless I get a lobotomy Monday that causes me to forget what I’ve witnessed the past 12 years, I’ll be a NO on the CR this week,” Massie posted Sunday on X.
If more than two Republicans vote it down, the measure won’t pass, assuming all lawmakers are in attendance.
In the Senate, the stopgap funding measure would also need at least seven moderate Dems to help it break the 60-vote filibuster.
Several — including Sens. Mark Warner of Virginia and Jon Ossoff of Georgia — have signaled their opposition already.
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