President Joe Biden signed the spending bill the Senate passed early Saturday morning, averting a government shutdown during the holiday season and capping several days of turmoil as the House speaker scrambled to craft legislation that would pass muster with President-elect Donald Trump.
The legislation was approved by the Senate in an 85-11 vote shortly after midnight and just hours after the House passed the measure 366-34.
It funds the government at current levels through March 14 and includes $100 billion in disaster aid and $10 billion in financial assistance to farmers.
But it does not include an extension of the debt ceiling that Trump had been demanding.
"The bipartisan funding bill I just signed keeps the government open and delivers the urgently needed disaster relief that I requested for recovering communities as well as the funds needed to rebuild the Francis Scott Key Bridge," Biden said in a statement released by the White House.
"This agreement represents a compromise, which means neither side got everything it wanted. But it rejects the accelerated pathway to a tax cut for billionaires that Republicans sought, and it ensures the government can continue to operate at full capacity," the president said.
House Speaker Mike Johnson called the House vote a "good outcome for the country," and noted that he had spoken to Trump who "was certainly happy about this outcome, as well."
It took Johnson, whose job appears to be in jeopardy over the stalemated legislation, three times to get the measure through the chamber.
The original version he negotiated with Democrats was scuttled by Trump and Elon Musk, the billionaire adviser to the president-elect who will head up a government efficiency panel, who pressured Republicans to oppose it.
A second pared down stopgap bill that included suspending the debt ceiling, went down to defeat 174-235 on Thursday, with 38 fiscally conservative Republican lawmakers defying Trump.
Meanwhile, Trump, who presided over a 35-day government shutdown in 2018, continued to demand action on the debt ceiling and wanted it to happen during the Biden administration.
"Congress must get rid of, or extend out to, perhaps, 2029, the ridiculous Debt Ceiling. Without this, we should never make a deal. Remember, the pressure is on whoever is President," Trump wrote on Truth Social just after midnight Friday.
Lawmakers believe Trump wants to remove limits to the federal debt, which is now $36 trillion, because he wants to extend or expand tax cuts he passed in his first term that would further extend the deficit.
Johnson considered splitting up the spending package into three separate provisions as Trump called for Congress to either get rid of the "ridiculous" debt ceiling or extend it to 2029.
"Without this, we should never make a deal," he said.
Originally published by Latin Times
