December stopgap funding bill readied for House floor action

House Republicans introduced a 12-week extension of federal spending with limited add-ons Sunday, a bill expected to garner large bipartisan majorities in both chambers.

The House will consider the 49-page bill this week to continue current funding levels through Dec. 20, and the Senate is expected to act shortly after. Congress must act by the end of the month to avoid a partial government shutdown, which top GOP leaders in both chambers argue would benefit no one politically, least of all their party.

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., plans to bring a rule paving the way for consideration of the bill to the floor by Wednesday, a House Republican leadership aide said Sunday. The House Rules Committee scheduled the measure for consideration at its 4 p.m. Monday meeting.

GOP leaders may need Democratic votes to adopt the rule, a task made more complicated by the omission of several policy and funding riders Democrats sought. Taking the bill up under suspension of the rules, which skips that initial procedural step but requires two-thirds support on the floor, remained an option.

After the speaker was forced to backtrack from his preferred option — a six-month funding extension tied to a controversial election security measure that Democrats said was aimed at voter suppression — Johnson is selling the new version as the best deal his conference can get.

“Since we fell a bit short of the goal line, an alternative plan is now required,” Johnson wrote to GOP lawmakers Sunday.

The latest iteration will “prevent the Senate from jamming us with a bill loaded with billions in new spending and unrelated provisions,” he wrote. “Our legislation will be a very narrow, bare-bones CR including only the extensions that are absolutely necessary.”

For those GOP hard-liners advocating a shutdown if they don’t get what they wanted, Johnson’s letter has some words of caution.

“As history has taught and current polling affirms, shutting the government down less than 40 days from a fateful election would be an act of political malpractice,” he wrote. The letter cites a McLaughlin & Associates poll of battleground districts that found 64 percent of likely voters oppose a shutdown, including 43 percent of GOP primary voters.

The shorter time frame does not guarantee final appropriations bills will be considered during the lame-duck period, the aide said, adding Republicans will likely prefer another stopgap bill running into the next Congress.

Still, many Republicans have expressed unease about being forced to vote on a lame-duck package so close to Christmas when it’s easier to slip in unwanted riders. Dec. 13 had been under consideration as the end date, although some lawmakers feared that date could disrupt military paychecks set to go out that day.

Senate Appropriations Chair Patty Murray, D-Wash., said the temporary spending bill reflected a bipartisan compromise negotiated at both ends of the Capitol, and pledged to use the extra time provided by the extension to get full-year bills enacted.

“Let’s get it passed and ensure we avert a needless and disastrous government shutdown,” Murray said in a statement Sunday. “I will be working closely with colleagues on both sides of the aisle to ensure we get the job done before the end of the year.”

Disaster aid, Secret Service, veterans

There is no supplemental disaster aid package attached to the CR, something Democrats had called for and for which Johnson had added $10 billion for the Federal Emergency Management Agency in the earlier six-month version. With the shorter time frame in this bill, the extra money wasn’t necessary, the GOP leadership aide said.

The legislation includes the typical anomaly that allows FEMA to tip into a full year’s appropriation up front, known as “spend faster” language. That will give the agency access to $20 billion starting Oct. 1, eliminating a shortfall FEMA faced that’s limited it to only the most critical and life-saving outlays since August.

The bill does include $231 million in new appropriations for the Secret Service to provide protection for presidential candidates, an issue that has taken center stage following two assassination attempts on former President and GOP nominee Donald Trump.

The added amounts for the Secret Service — which crept up in the final hours of bargaining — is confined to the agency’s immediate needs for campaign purposes, and is contingent on the agency meeting lawmakers’ demands for information as it conducts oversight of the agency. A separate provision would enable the Secret Service to tap into its extended funding allocation faster if needed, similar to the FEMA flexibility provision.

The bill also would provide several targeted increases associated with the presidential transition, including $47 million for District of Columbia emergency planning and security costs associated with inauguration activities.

While the Republican’s initial bill included $1.95 billion for the Navy’s Virginia-class submarine program, the latest stopgap bill does not include that money. The aide said congressional appropriators and authorizers worked with the administration to come up with an “alternative way to address that issue.”

Congressional Democrats and the administration had sought to use this stopgap as a chance to fill the $12 billion gap in funding veterans health care, but that funding is not included in the bill.

The GOP aide said the VA will have access to $142 billion and will be able to spend it as quickly as needed under the legislation. The aide said the short time frame allowed the VA funding debate to be punted.

There’s still a package of health care and other veterans-related provisions that lawmakers tacked onto the CR. Provisions range from extending the VA’s ability to collect co-pays for inpatient hospital and nursing home care to boosting the funding allocation for disabled veterans training in the Paralympic and Olympic Sports program.

Other items

Other provisions included in the temporary spending bill include:

• Extensions of expiring Temporary Assistance for Needy Families funding and the National Flood Insurance Program’s authorization.

• Health care provisions including extending the availability of funding to implement the surprise billing law enacted in late 2020, Medicaid funding for the Northern Mariana Islands and delaying pending clinical laboratory payment cuts under Medicare.

• Homeland security-related extensions, including of lapsing authorities to operate interagency task forces to combat drug trafficking and counter drone threats at special events and large public gatherings.

• Extension of a USDA program that replaces stolen food stamp benefits.

• Language preventing a steep pay cut for U.S. diplomats and overseas aid workers.

• The traditional benefit paid out to the families of deceased lawmakers.

• Missing from the bill are White House-requested increases to the rate of funding for Social Security Administration expenses and expanded loan guarantee authority for State Department financing of Ukrainian purchases of U.S. military equipment.

The bill also omits a higher funding rate for the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, though it would allow the Agriculture Department to tap into existing “WIC” funds faster if needed to avoid disruptions.

Murray and House Appropriations ranking member Rosa DeLauro made clear that various items left out of the CR will need to be addressed after the elections.

“While this three-month funding bill would avert a needless government shutdown and avoids many of the problems associated with a continuing resolution that lasts until March, it leaves a number of holes and fails to address many issues that must be solved in December,” DeLauro, D-Conn., said in a statement.

If the House can pass the bill Wednesday, the Senate will only have five days to pass it to avoid a partial government shutdown, and only two remaining days of session before the upcoming October recess.

However, while at least a few Senate Republicans will seek amendment votes, lawmakers appear eager to return home to campaign, and the process is likely to be truncated.