The House on Tuesday approved a novel plan to prevent a government shutdown, with the recently installed Republican House speaker, Mike Johnson, relying on Democratic votes as the far-right flank of his caucus dissented.
A coalition of nearly every Democratic representative and more mainstream Republicans joined forces to advance the stopgap spending package by a vote of 336 to 95, easily clearing the two-thirds threshold needed for passage under an expedited process. Ninety-three Republicans and two Democrats opposed the bill, which would fund the federal government into early 2024.
The vote comes as federal agencies began preparing for a possible shutdown that would halt paychecks to millions of federal workers, including members of the military, days before the Thanksgiving holiday.
The bill next goes to the Senate, where the majority leader, Chuck Schumer, has said his chamber will vote on the measure “as soon as possible”. The Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, has also endorsed the plan.
Johnson’s untested “laddered” approach would extend funding for federal agencies into the new year, with two staggered deadlines designed to give lawmakers more time to finish drafting longer-term spending bills.
Ahead of Tuesday’s vote, the House Democratic leadership encouraged their caucus to support the Republican plan, arguing it was consistent with their pledge to “always put people over politics and try to find common ground with our Republican colleagues wherever possible”.
“Once again, Democrats have saved the country from Republican chaos,” Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro, a Connecticut Democrat and the ranking member of the House appropriations committee, said in a statement after casting her vote for the stopgap measure. She said it was now time for the leaders of the appropriations committees in both chambers to immediately “begin a good-faith conference process” on the annual spending bills.
By pursuing a path that required the support of Democrats, Johnson circumvented for now a bitter showdown over government spending that led hardline Republicans to depose his predecessor, the former speaker Kevin McCarthy.
Johnson, a self-described “arch-conservative” who was the Republicans’ third choice to replace McCarthy, argued that the “innovation” of his proposal put conservatives in the “best position to fight” for deep spending cuts next year.
Under Johnson’s “laddered” plan, funding for federal agencies would be extended in two parts, with some departments set to run through 19 January and others through 2 February. Despite the attempt to rebrand it, Johnson’s proposal is still a continuing resolution that would temporarily maintain spending at levels set at the end of last year, when Democrats controlled the chamber, with none of the steep cuts conservatives want.
During a floor debate on the measure, several House Republican appropriators encouraged their colleagues to support the continuing resolution, which they said would allot lawmakers more time to finish their work on the annual spending bills.
“A government shutdown right before the holidays does our nation no good,” said congressman Hal Rogers, a Republican from Kentucky and the dean of the House. “We need more time.”
Several of the conservatives who revolted against the last Republican-led stopgap measure, triggering McCarthy’s removal, again disapproved of Johnson’s plan as it did not include any spending cuts or policy changes.
“It contains no spending reductions, no border security and not a single meaningful win for the American people,” the House Freedom Caucus, a hard-right coalition of conservatives, said in a statement announcing their opposition earlier on Tuesday. “Republicans must stop negotiating against ourselves over fears of what the Senate may do with the promise ‘roll over today and we’ll fight tomorrow’.”
Despite their objections, the group signaled that its members were unlikely to push to depose Johnson for working with Democrats to pass spending legislation, as they did with McCarthy: “While we remain committed to working with Speaker Johnson, we need bold change.”
Johnson insisted he shared their conservative policy goals but said there was neither enough time left on the calendar nor enough agreement among House Republicans, with their whisker-thin majority, to advance a more aggressive spending bill.
“We’re not surrendering,” Johnson said. “We’re fighting, but you have to be wise about choosing the fights. You got to fight fights that you can win.”
Just three weeks after Republicans finally elected a new speaker after nearly a month of chaos and dysfunction that halted business in the House, there is little appetite for risking a federal government shutdown – or another speakership fight.
Asked if he was concerned that bringing this proposal would mean the end of his nascent speakership, Johnson said he was not.
“This is a very different situation,” he said. “We’re taking this into the new year to finish the process.”
Before the vote, the House rejected a series of amendments offered by conservatives that would have cut funding for, among other federal initiatives, the Minority HIV/Aids Fund.
Top Democrats were not happy with whatSchumer called the “goofy laddered” approach, but saw it as the only path to prevent a shutdown in the narrowing window before Friday’s midnight deadline.
Leaving their caucus meeting on Tuesday morning, Hakeem Jeffries, the House minority leader, said Democrats were still evaluating the proposal but appeared open to voting for it. The proposal did not contain the sort of “poisonous, political partisan policy provisions” that Jeffries said would be a nonstarter.
“House Democrats have repeatedly articulated that any continuing resolution must be set at the fiscal year 2023 spending level, be devoid of harmful cuts and free of extreme rightwing policy riders,” Democratic leaders said in a statement ahead of the vote. “The continuing resolution before the House today meets that criteria and we will support it.”
They also called on Congress to “advance the supplemental national security and domestic policy funding requested by President Joe Biden”. The White House’s request for wartime aid to Ukraine and Israel is not part of the continuing resolution.
The White House was initially critical of the plan when it was unveiled over the weekend. But speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Schumer said he had consulted with the White House and was confident the president shared his view that if Johnson’s plan “can avoid a shutdown it will be a good thing”.
“It has to be bipartisan and right now,” Schumer told reporters, “that’s the path we seem to be on.”
