Senate approves $1.1T spending bill through September

The Senate voted Thursday to approve a $1.1 trillion spending bill to fund the government through September, preventing a government shutdown.

President Donald Trump is expected to sign the measure, which passed 79 to 18. It includes more than $15 billion in new defense spending and $1.5 billion in money for U.S. border security, ahead of a deadline to keep the government open past Friday.

The five-month spending measure clears the way for Congress to begin talks over spending priorities for the fiscal year that begins in October. Mr. Trump has already outlined a request for GOP lawmakers to slash $54 billion from domestic programs to help pay for an equal increase in defense spending. Democrats have vowed to fight the spending cuts but some Republicans view the current spending bill as a down payment on a plan to win greater defense spending in the future.

“This bill is a solid first step toward regaining our readiness and maintaining a capable and modern military,” said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, the second-ranking Republican in the Senate. “Some of that readiness has been seriously called into question from some of our lack of prioritizing defense spending.”

Democrats have signaled that they are open to some defense spending increases, but only if Republicans agree to equal increases for domestic spending. Democrats will again have some leverage in the upcoming spending talks because their votes will be necessary to approve any spending measure in the Senate.

Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee, said Thursday that he expects that Republican leaders will be willing to work with Democrats on a compromise spending bill to avoid a nasty budget fight later this year.

The spending measure was the result of weeks of bipartisan negotiations in which Republicans ultimately backed away from Mr. Trump’s demands for money to begin constructing a wall along the U.S.Mexico border.

Instead, GOP leaders agreed to Democrats’ demands that the new border-security money come with strict limitations requiring the Trump administration to use it only for technology investments and to repair existing fencing and infrastructure.

Deportation defended

Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly defended the administration’s decision to deport a Honduran mother and her 5-year-old child back to their violence-ridden homeland, saying that if Congress doesn’t want the administration doing that it should change the law.

“You can’t pick and choose the laws that you follow. I can’t pick and choose the laws I enforce,” Mr. Kelly said Thursday morning at a forum on poverty and violence in Central America.

Mr. Kelly was addressing a tweet-storm aimed at the White House on Wednesday by Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., over the deportation. Mr. Casey said the mother had been threatened with death in Honduras.

Dodd-Frank overhaul

House Republicans took a major step toward their long-promised goal of unwinding the stricter financial rules created after the 2008 crisis.

The Republican-led House Financial Services Committee pushed forward sweeping legislation in a party-line, 34-26 vote that would undo much of former President Barack Obama’s landmark DoddFrank banking law.