US Heads Towards Shutdown

Key Takeaways
  • Chaos amongst House Republicans prevents progress on efforts to avoid October 1 government shutdown.
  • Even the normally straightforward issue of funding Department of Defense got bogged down on two separate occasions this week.
  • The Senate is now also attempting to craft a bipartisan measure on a 60-day Continuing Resolution to fund the federal government past October 1.

The US House fell into chaos as Speaker McCarthy couldn’t find a pathway to start the debate on spending bills or reach a consensus on a Continuing Resolution (CR) to fund the government for 30 or 60 days and avoid a shutdown on October 1.

On Tuesday, the Speaker and his team unveiled a strategy where they would take one of the least controversial spending bills, funding the Department of Defense (DoD), and get it passed. It was hoped that this would show that they were in control and had a plan to fund the government.

The first vote on most House bills is on the Rule, which outlines the parameters under which the bill will be debated — issues such as how long the debate will be and what amendments can be offered.  The vote on the Rule almost always passes with the votes of the majority party. With the Republican slim majority, they can only lose four votes and on Tuesday five Republicans voted against the Rule and it failed on a vote of 212 to 214 with all Democrats voting NO.  After two days of intraparty talks, the Speaker thought he had the votes to try the DoD bill again on Thursday. Six Republicans voted NO, and the Rule was defeated on a vote of 212 to 216.  Realizing that the Republican caucus was far from an agreement on even the most basic government funding bill, the House was sent home Thursday afternoon to try again next week.

There are now bipartisan talks in the Senate about passing a CR to fund the government for 60 days and send that bill to the House. Senate leadership and staff will work over the weekend on the specifics of the bill. However, with the government funding deadline next Saturday, the finish line is hard to see.

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