WASHINGTON — Appropriators plan to introduce a long-awaited omnibus spending package Monday afternoon in the Senate and pass it before Christmas Eve, House Appropriations Chair Rosa DeLauro said Thursday.
Since announcing a bipartisan framework for a fiscal 2023 omnibus measure Tuesday night, lawmakers have been scrambling to write a complex bill spanning thousands of pages.
“We’re going to get an omnibus next week,” said DeLauro, a Connecticut Democrat. “I’m resolute. I can’t account for crazy things that come up, but that’s my goal.”
DeLauro said she was “hoping” for compromise subcommittee allocations to be ready on Thursday, which the dozen panels and their staff will spend the weekend using to draft the final package. Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard, D-Calif., who chairs the Homeland Security subcommittee, said she and her colleagues were “very close” to receiving their topline figures.
Appropriators are also awaiting decisions from leadership about what goes into the “ash and trash” title of the omnibus — appropriations-speak for unrelated legislation from authorizing committees that often gets tacked on to a moving year-end vehicle.
Current stopgap funding is set to expire at midnight Friday, but the House passed another continuing resolution Wednesday to extend funding through Dec. 23. And the Senate is working to pass that measure Thursday if they can get a unanimous consent agreement to streamline the process, said Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer.
“We should have no drama, no gridlock and no delay in passing a weeklong CR,” Schumer said on the floor.
Some Senate Republicans were pushing for amendment votes that could delay quick passage of the stopgap measure, however.
Rick Scott, R-Fla., said he’s seeking a vote on an amendment to cut funding for the IRS as part of consideration of the continuing resolution. “I can’t imagine why we wouldn’t get the amendment vote, but it’s up to Schumer,” he said.
Rand Paul of Kentucky said he wants the chamber to vote on an amendment extending the expiration date into early next year, when Republicans will be better-positioned to secure policy wins in the spending package.
No details of the omnibus framework deal have been disclosed, but it is expected to provide close to $1.7 trillion in discretionary spending for fiscal 2023, including about $858 billion for defense and a still-undetermined amount of emergency aid for Ukraine and natural disasters.
A partisan dispute over nondefense spending stalled talks, with Democrats pushing for more funding than Republicans would allow.
Part of the dispute was over the treatment of veteran health care funds, with both parties pushing hefty increases but Republicans wanting to keep a lid on other nondefense accounts to preserve room. Senate Veterans’ Affairs Chairman Jon Tester, D-Mont., said Thursday that negotiators had agreed to make a portion of the funding “mandatory” so it wouldn’t count against appropriators’ allocations.
The omnibus bill is set to begin in the Senate, where bipartisan support is critical because the Democratic majority lacks the 60 votes needed to advance legislation on their own. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., set a Dec. 22 deadline for Senate action. The House could then follow suit by Dec. 23, barring a delay.
The House on Thursday sent a shell bill to the Senate to use as the vehicle, enabling senators to add the omnibus and any unrelated authorizing and tax provisions lawmakers agree to. The procedural mechanism also allows the Senate to skip one cloture vote, though on final passage they would still need 60 votes to end debate if there are objections.
———
(Roll Call staff writer Lindsey McPherson contributed to this report.)
