Shutdown Threat Delayed

Facing a midnight deadline tonight, and a dreaded DC snowstorm, Congress acted quickly yesterday to pass a government funding bill that pushes big spending decisions off until the first week of March.

When Mike Johnson became Speaker, he initiated an idea to break up the 12 spending bills so that they all didn’t expire on the same day. He believed that this would improve the chances that Congress could avoid a massive Omnibus Spending Bill where the entire government is funded in one bill. Johnson is right in arguing that with a huge bill, accountability disappears and the practice of reviewing spending in the 12-bill appropriations process is lost.

Given this, Johnson was understandably reluctant to pass another Continuing Resolution (CR) to fund the entire government for five weeks. However, there was no real alternative.

The CR passed the Senate with a strong bipartisan vote of 77 to 18, and in the House nearly half the Republican caucus voted NO. The final tally was 314 to 108 with 106 of the NO votes coming from Republicans. The conservative Freedom Caucus wanted to add an immigration bill to the CR, but this was a non-starter. The fact of the matter is that many of the 106 NO voting Republicans would likely vote against any spending bill. Speaker Johnson did the best he could considering the weak hand he was holding.

New Hampshire

This coming Tuesday, Republican voters in New Hampshire go to the polls for the first primary of this Presidential election season. Independents are eligible to vote in the NH primaries, and polling indicates that they may come to the polls and vote for Nikki Haley. Polling also suggests that the former South Carolina Governor and UN Ambassador has considerably more support in NH than she did in Iowa. If those opposed to re-nominating former President Trump want to gain any traction, he needs to be stopped somewhere, and NH may be the last chance to slow his momentum.

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