$1.3 trillion budget bill passes House
Senate stalls bill with concerns over massive debt
WASHINGTON — Congress was poised to pass a giant $1.3 trillion spending bill that would end the budget battles for now, but not without risking another shutdown as conservatives objected to big outlays on Democratic priorities at a time when Republicans control the House, Senate and White House.
This would be the third federal shutdown this year, an outcome both parties want to avoid. But in crafting a sweeping deal that busts budget caps, they’ve stirred conservative opposition and set the contours for the next funding fight ahead of the midterm election.
The House easily approved the measure Thursday, 256-167, a bipartisan tally that underscored the popularity of the compromise, which funds the government through September. It beefs up military and domestic programs, delivering federal funds to every corner of the country.
But action stalled in the Senate, as conservatives ran the clock in protest. They can’t stop the bill indefinitely. But without agreement, voting would spill into the weekend, past the midnight Friday deadline to fund the government.
“Shame, shame. A pox on both Houses -- and parties,” tweeted Sen. Rand Paul, RKy., who spent the afternoon tweeting details found in the 2,200-page bill that was released the night before. “No one has read it. Congress is broken.”
The omnibus spending bill was supposed to be an antidote to the stopgap measures Congress has been forced to pass — five in this fiscal year alone — to keep government temporarily running amid part is an fiscal disputes.
Leaders delivered on President Donald Trump’s top priorities of boosting Pentagon coffers and starting work on his promised border wall, while compromising with Democrats on funds for road building, child care development, fighting the opioid crisis and more.
But the result has been unimaginable to many Republicans after campaigning on spending restraints and balanced budgets. Along with the recent GOP tax cuts law, the bill that stood a foot tall at some lawmakers’ desks ushers in the return of $1 trillion deficits.
Mr. Trump reluctantly backed the bill he would have to sign, according to Republican lawmakers and aides, who acknowledged the deal involved necessary trade-offs for the Democratic votes that were needed for passage despite their majority lock on Congress.
“Obviously he doesn’t like this process — it’s dangerous to put it up to the 11th hour like this,” said Sen. David Perdue, RGa., who opposes the bill and speaks regularly to Mr. Trump. “The president, and our leadership, and the leadership in the House got together and said, Look, we don’t like what the Democrats are doing, [but we’ve] got to fund the government.”
White House legislative director Marc Short framed it as a compromise. “I can’t sit here and tell you and your viewers that we love everything in the bill,” he said on Fox. “But we think that we got many of our priorities funded.”
The bill received mixed support from Western Pennsylvania’s Republican delegation. Reps. Glenn “G.T.” Thompson, R-Centre, and Bill Shuster, R-Hollidaysburg, supported it while Reps. Mike Kelly, R-Butler, and Keith Rothfus, R-Sewickley, opposed it. The region’s only Democrat, Rep. Mike Doyle, D-Forrest Hills, voted in favor.
Mr. Rothfus said it was irresponsible to force a vote on the massive spending plan less than a day after it was introduced. Constituents didn’t elect him to rubber-stamp omnibus bills “that are written in the shadows and dropped on my desk the night before the vote,” he said.