The Senate passed a bill Thursday to avert a partial government shutdown as Congress raced a day before a spending deadline to send President Biden temporary legislation to fund federal agencies through early March.
The 77-18 vote cleared the way for a House vote later Thursday on the measure, which would give lawmakers more time to pass spending bills totaling $1.66 trillion to fund the government in the fall, the level for which Democrats and Republicans agreed to this month. This plan would keep most federal spending steady while supporting the military.
The temporary legislation “will give Congress time to continue working on the appropriations process to fund the government through the end of the fiscal year,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader.
House leaders said they would take up the measure and pass it quickly in a vote expected later in the evening, as lawmakers rushed to leave Washington ahead of a forecast blizzard they feared could ground flights and strand them in the capital for the weekend.
Action in Congress would clear the measure for Mr. Biden, who is expected to quickly sign it before a midnight deadline on Friday. It will mark the third time since the fiscal year began on Oct. 1 that Congress has temporarily extended spending. Lawmakers from both parties hope it will be the last and that Congress can wrap up spending for the year by early March.
The House vote promised to be an unpleasant experience for Speaker Mike Johnson, who negotiated the overall spending package with Mr. Schumer and was savaged by the far-right faction of the House for not pushing for bigger cuts. He would need a significant number of Democrats to support the measure given expected Republican opposition.
Even consideration of the bill represents a U-turn by the speaker, who vowed last year never to undertake another short-term spending package. But time is running out to pass the 12 separate bills that fund the government, forcing the hand of Mr. Johnson, who does not want House Republicans to be blamed for disruptions to government services heading into the November election.
To overcome procedural objections to moving it forward quickly in the Senate, Mr. Schumer allowed Republicans to vote on three proposed changes that would effectively defeat the measure. But all fell short, clearing the way for approval and a vote in the House.
As he did in the fall with the previous temporary spending bill, Mr. Johnson will then have to use special procedures to speed the measure through the House, limiting debate and requiring a two-thirds majority, which is likely to be made up of more Democrats than Republicans. .
Under the legislation, funding for agriculture, veterans programs, transportation, housing and other federal operations would be preserved through March 1, with funding for the rest of the government, including the Pentagon, expiring on March 8.
With the extra time, members of the House and Senate appropriations committees hope to push through a dozen bills to fund the government at the level of spending agreed upon by Mr. Johnson and Mr. Schumer. But it won’t be easy.
Beyond objections to the spending itself, far-right conservatives in the House of Representatives have pushed for the measures to include restrictions on abortion and other restrictions on government powers that Democrats say they will not pass, setting up a battle over those policy provisions.
“We still have an awful lot of work to do in a short amount of time to finalize serious appropriations bills, without partisan poison pills, that protect key investments in our country’s future,” said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Washington and chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee.
