Congress has just 10 days until government funding runs out, but lawmakers have not struck a deal to keep the lights on over the holidays.
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle expect the government to keep businesses open past the Dec. 20 shutdown deadline. But negotiators are leaving colleagues guessing how that will be achieved as funding talks reach a critical stage.
Negotiators have cited ongoing work to evaluate disaster relief as a key element of discussions, with members saying that they will continue to work alongside the funding stopgap, also known as the Continuing Resolution (CR), to be passed this month. We hope that disaster relief will be carried out.
House Appropriations Chairman Tom Cole (R-Okla.) last week announced he was leading negotiators on the Biden administration's “strong” request for more than $100 billion in disaster aid in response to hurricanes Helen and Milton. The company said it is continuing to investigate.
“As I said before, they're very robust. I think they should be. I think we're really in for a disaster,” he said of the proposal.
But while the president's request includes tens of billions of dollars in funding for disaster programs like the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Cole also said that “additional funding for non-disaster-related programs does not include “I'm not interested in that, and part of that is included in the president's proposal.” ”
In their disaster funding request, Republicans named requests for funding not only for the Environmental Protection Agency but also for the State Department and the Department of Education.
Rep. Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, also said the lack of a key agreement on disaster relief is slowing funding talks.
“There hasn't been any serious discussion about what's out there. The question is, we have to get to the top line so we can start moving forward.” She spoke recently while discussing disaster relief and overall negotiations. Government funding.
Since Congress returned from recess in November, shortly after Hurricanes Milton and Helen, bipartisan calls for leaders to pass disaster relief legislation have grown louder.
Cole noted that while Congress could address disaster needs “on its own,” leadership believes “that would help trigger a CR.”
His comments came a day after the hard-line conservative House Freedom Caucus opposed the “no-pay” disaster aid bill, saying it would “not contribute a dime to the Biden administration.”
The statement was not surprising, as members of the caucus had already expressed reservations about the size and scope of the Biden administration's disaster aid request. But this suggests that Republican leaders will likely need another Democratic vote to pass a final stopgap funding bill in the House to avoid a funding shortfall before the start of the next Congress. There is.
Other items, such as funding for the IRS and funding for the Social Security Administration, could also become a focus of spending talks as time runs out in the current Congress and pressure on lawmakers increases.
Lawmakers expect leadership to land on a stopgap until March of next year, but some Republicans in both chambers are pushing for an early end to CR in order to force Congress to finish funding work faster. .
Others are concerned that President-elect Trump will spend too much of his first months in office finalizing the 2025 spending bill.
“My view is that instead of forcing the issue on President Trump, we should tie the ribbon on it now and avoid distracting from reconciliation, which is our greatest opportunity to change policy direction.” That's what House Budget Committee Chairwoman Jody Arrington (R-Texas) told reporters last week.
“Whatever we decide, we're going to rally around it and pull it together,” he added. But he warned Congress against “dragging all of last year's problems into next year in this new administration and new Congress.”
Trump's second inauguration is still more than a month away, but Republicans in Congress are already accelerating broad plans to advance the president-elect's tax and spending agenda next year.
Republicans, with tenuous control of both chambers and the White House, are seeking a special but limited package that would allow them to pass sweeping tax changes and border policy in early 2025, despite expected Democratic opposition in the Senate. We are paying attention to budgetary measures.
Lawmakers will also have to fight over how to tackle the nation's debt ceiling next year. And while a trifecta of Republican victories makes it unlikely that the kind of partisan conflict over the national borrowing limit that Washington witnessed last year in a divided Congress is unlikely, the nation's $36 trillion in debt is It is possible that some drama could ensue as it stirs up concerns among hawks.
Republicans also have concerns that funding will come too late into next year, as significant delays in Congress' funding efforts could force the government to implement across-the-board cuts in the spring.
“That certainly needs to happen by April, otherwise you're going to be cutting defense across the board and increasing non-defense, which I don't think is what the Republican conference wants to do,” Cole said. he said, adding that he thought so. “The faster we can close the deal, the better off we are.”
