‘Government remains open!’ US Senate averts shutdown as stopgap bill approved
THE US Senate has averted a government shutdown as the upper chamber of the US Congress approved a stopgap bill.
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The stopgap spending measure which will find the government until February 18, has now been sent to President Joe Biden for his signature. On Thursday night, the Senate approved the bill 69-28, following a day of negotiations between Senate leaders and GOPs.
Speaking after the vote, Majority Leader of the US Senate Chuck Schumer, said: “I’m happy to let the American people know the government remains open.”
According to the Washington Post, the bill also included a $7bn aid package to help Afghan evacuees.
Had the bill not passed, government funding would have been set to expire on Saturday morning.
The last time the federal government shutdown was under the Trump administration in 2018-19 when US lawmakers failed to make an impasse over funding for the US-Mexico border wall.
The shutdown under the Trump administration was the longest stretch in US history, lasting 35 days.
Before the vote, some Republican senators had threatened to oppose the bill in a bid to destabilise Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate efforts.
Congress will now be aiming to engage in long-term fiscal planning for 2022 and raise the federal debt limit later this month.
The latest stopgap bill comes after the Senate repeatedly shot down funding bills passed by the House.
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According to The Hill, of the nine funding bills passed by the House, not a single one has been approved by the Senate.
Vermont Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Appropriations Committee, said lawmakers were still working on the spending bills for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1.
Senator Leahy said: “Further refusal to meet at the negotiating table will only undermine national security, our ability to invest in American families, and our capability to respond to the coronavirus and its emerging variants.”
Earlier on Thursday, the stopgap bill was approved by the House in a much closer vote, passing 221 to 212.
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Republican Adam Kinzinger of Illinois was the only member of the GOP to join Democrats in voting for the resolution.