Congressional leaders reached an agreement on final fiscal 2024 appropriations bills Wednesday that will pave the way for lawmakers to wrap up the process in two packages in the coming days and weeks.
Funding for agencies covered by the Agriculture, Energy-Water, Military Construction-VA and Transportation-HUD bills would be extended from March 1 through March 8 in a stopgap bill. Those agencies’ full-year bills would then join the Interior-Enviroment and Commerce-Justice-Science bills in the first tranche to be voted on next week.
Appropriators are aiming to release text for the first batch of bills by Sunday in order for the House to be able to turn around and vote Wednesday, before Thursday gets swallowed up by President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address. In theory, that would give the Senate time to get the first package to Biden’s desk before the impacts of a partial shutdown on those agencies subject to the new March 8 deadline are felt.
