Another stopgap

House passes another stopgap set to languish in the Senate

By JENNIFER SCHOLTES and HUGH T. FERGUSON

The House passed a bill Thursday afternoon that would reopen the nine shuttered federal departments through Feb. 28, in Democrats' latest legislative attempt to end the partial government shutdown.

The chamber agreed on a voice vote to advance the measure which joins the pile of eight other House-passed spending bills Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has vowed to cast aside until he gets the blessing of President Donald Trump, who refuses to sign any funding measures that don't include at least $5 billion for the border wall.

In opposing the bill, Republicans argued that any action short of a bipartisan deal on border security funding is wrongheaded.

"We know that the cure that they are offering on the other side will not work," Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.) said on the floor. "We have got to come to the table with a new cure, a new solution, and yes, a compromise."

Under the legislation, the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Justice, State, Transportation and Treasury would all be funded through the end of February.

"The order of business, my friends, should be simple," House Appropriations Chairwoman Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.) said on the floor before the vote. "We open the government, pay federal employees and then negotiate on border security and immigration policy. It is long past time for my colleagues across the aisle and across the Capitol to come to their senses."