House Republicans on Friday night rolled out their stopgap bill to extend current government funding rates into the first quarter of next year, including GOP-drafted legislation aimed at purging noncitizens from voter rolls that will alienate Democrats and require party unity to get through the chamber.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., listed the stopgap measure on his floor schedule for the upcoming week. The Rules Committee is scheduled to meet at 4 p.m. Monday to consider the bill, which would create a new deadline of March 28 to head off a partial government shutdown. The current deadline is Sept. 30.
While senators are expected to make changes to the package, Speaker Mike Johnson is teeing up the combo bill to draw a contrast with Democrats on an issue Republicans believe they have a political edge on.
“Today, House Republicans are taking a critically important step to keep the federal government funded and to secure our federal election process,” Johnson, R-La., said in a statement. “Congress has a responsibility to do both, and we must ensure that only American citizens can decided American elections.”
The new proof-of-citizenship requirements in the bill have long been considered a goner in the Democratic-controlled Senate, which was confirmed in a Friday night statement from Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., and Senate Appropriations Chair Patty Murray, D-Wash.
“As we have said repeatedly, avoiding a government shutdown requires bipartisanship, not a bill drawn up by one party,” Murray and Schumer said. “If Speaker Johnson drives House Republicans down this highly partisan path, the odds of a shutdown go way up, and Americans will know that the responsibility of a shutdown will be on the House Republicans’ hands.”
Farm bill, Ukraine, disaster aid
A shutdown seems unlikely at this point unless Johnson declines to put a “clean” bill on the floor later this month, assuming the Senate sends one back. But there are a number of less-publicized skirmishes that also need to get worked out.
What to do about the expiring farm bill is one of those. The White House sought an extension as part of the stopgap bill, since the House and Senate remain far apart on the multiyear reauthorization due this month. While there had been discussion of a one-year extension earlier this week, the bill unveiled Friday night wouldn’t touch the farm bill.
There may be some flexibility, however, in that the worst consequences don’t kick in until the end of the calendar year, when current milk price supports expire. That would cause what’s known as a “dairy cliff” — when costs could skyrocket for consumers and the government since the Agriculture Department would be forced to buy up large quantities at more than double current prices, driving up demand. Last year’s farm bill extension wasn’t enacted until November.
Also gone is language the White House requested to extend the deadline for drawing down U.S. weapons and equipment stockpiles to send to Ukrainian forces battling the Russians. The spring supplemental authorized $7.8 billion worth of transfers, but as of late August, just $1.6 billion had been used, according to administration documents. Without an extension, that authority would lapse on Oct. 1.
With a substantial portion of the Republican Conference opposed to additional aid for Ukraine, extending that presidential drawdown authority could have provoked vote-counting issues for GOP leadership.
Numerous other traditional authorizing riders are missing, such as a package of health care extenders. Nor would the measure appropriate $1 billion extra for refugees arriving from Cuba, Haiti and Ukraine, or a special benefit extension for Ukrainian “parolees” allowed to remain in the U.S. due to emergency circumstances, as the White House requested.
The bill does include a major supplemental appropriation of $10 billion to restock the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s disaster relief fund, which dipped into deficit last month. In addition, FEMA would gain access to an entire year’s appropriation up front, for a total of $30 billion in disaster relief funding made available on Oct. 1.
Other items in the stopgap bill include:
Veterans health care. The Department of Veterans Affairs is facing a $12 billion gap in its health care accounts for the next fiscal year due to increased demand caused by the implementation of the 2022 law that expanded health care access to veterans exposed to toxins. The White House sought the full $12 billion in the continuing resolution, but instead the bill includes “spend-faster” language that will allow the department to spend what is needed from its full-year appropriation.
While Republicans believe the provision will allow the agency to maintain necessary medical care activities, Democrats are seizing on the omission of extra funding. House Appropriations ranking member Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., said in a statement that the GOP bill is “shortchanging veterans and jeopardizing the medical services they need and have earned.”
A separate $3 billion shortfall in veterans benefit programs, also related to toxic-exposure law demand, is the subject of stand-alone legislation introduced by a bipartisan Senate group before the recess and House GOP appropriators on Friday.
Submarines. The bill includes $1.95 billion for the Virginia-class submarine program, which the White House requested in its “anomalies” request submitted late last month. The administration said the anomaly was needed to ensure the Pentagon could continue to sign contracts for two submarines during the stopgap period.
Payments to spouses. The bill includes customary one-time, $174,000 payments to the spouses or heirs of three deceased Democratic lawmakers, all of whom died this summer: Bill Pascrell Jr. of New Jersey, Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas and Donald M. Payne Jr. of New Jersey.
Other anomalies. The bill includes an extension of the national flood insurance program through the length of the stopgap, and also has text that will allow the Coast Guard to continue its acquisition process for a commercial icebreaker, which has been a longstanding priority of the Alaska delegation. Under the bill, the Army Corps of Engineers will be authorized to pay Canada in fiscal 2025 for space for flood prevention efforts in the Columbia River Basin as well.
Carping from both sides
Whether Johnson will be able to muscle the bill through the House remains an open question.
It’s already facing some opposition from usual suspects on the right who do not support spending bills, like Montana’s Matt Rosendale, though House Freedom Caucus member Chip Roy, R-Texas, has been a vocal supporter of the speaker’s approach. Former President Donald Trump, the GOP presidential nominee, is another advocate.
Johnson could get an assist from a few vulnerable Democrats running for reelection in red states, but would have to limit defections from Republicans to have a chance of passage.
Some defense hawks on the right might take issue with generally flat funding for the Pentagon for half the fiscal year, a point that White House budget director Shalanda Young played up in her comments Friday night.
“Their 6-month CR approach ignores pressing needs that have real consequences for our defense, our veterans, and our communities,” Young said in a statement.
But it’s not yet clear whether the six-month extension is a dealbreaker with senators, who may be just as reluctant to return to Washington after the elections to wrap up unfinished business as their House counterparts.
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