Doomed 6-month stopgap funding patch

House Republicans prepare doomed 6-month stopgap funding patch

House GOP leaders are hoping to put swing-district Democrats in a bind over a proof-of-citizenship add-on to the spending legislation.

By Caitlin Emma and Jennifer Scholtes

Speaker Mike Johnson's stopgap spending plan is slated to clear its first test Monday, but its fate on the House floor is still far from certain.

The chamber's Rules Committee kicked off a meeting Monday afternoon to prepare to send the funding bill to the House floor, likely on Wednesday. The legislation would punt a government shutdown deadline, currently scheduled to hit on Oct. 1, into the end of March, and includes a conservative-favored bill that would require proof of citizenship to register to vote.

Johnson’s six-month funding punt, known as a continuing resolution or a CR, represents House Republicans’ opening offer in the sprint to avoid a government shutdown, one the Democratic-controlled Senate will surely reject. Right now, it’s unclear if it can even pass the House, since Democratic support will be scarce and the number of GOP holdouts is uncertain.

“I think you’re going to see a CR out of here this week,” Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) said as he walked into the Rules Committee meeting. Biggs declined to say if he would vote for the bill, however, instead winking and saying he planned to offer amendments.

At least one conservative on the Rules Committee, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), said he will oppose the measure this week. During the Rules meeting, Massie lamented the "political theater" that he said will likely result in a massive year-end government funding deal that will do nothing to cut spending. Democrats have pushed for a more straightforward CR that extends the government shutdown deadline into mid-December, without policy bills attached.

"Why are we funding things we don't like? We don't have to," he said. "It's because we're addicted to spending. And this doesn't do anything about the addiction, at all."

Massie also predicted that Republicans will ultimately "cave" and drop the proof-of-citizenship bill, known as the SAVE Act, which Democrats broadly oppose attaching to a stopgap.

A number of Republicans, including top appropriators, have warned that a lengthy stopgap into early next year won’t yield GOP leaders more leverage in government funding negotiations, even if the party controls both chambers and the White House. Conservatives have argued for kicking the deadline into March so a potential President Donald Trump could influence negotiations. But neither party is expected to hold a Senate supermajority next year, meaning any final spending deal will still need bipartisan backing to get through the upper chamber in 2025.

In a veto threat issued on Monday, the White House is also warning that a six-month funding patch will prove detrimental to the military, hurting GOP priorities like military readiness goals and efforts to deter China. Johnson's stopgap would fund the government through March 28.

“It’s madness,” said Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), the top Democratic appropriator in the House. She also lamented a lack of money to address a looming veterans’ health funding cliff, among other issues.

Johnson’s end date of March 28 is also dangerously close to an April 30 deadline that would trigger across-the-board spending cuts if Congress fails to fund the government in full and on time, a consequence of last summer’s debt limit deal. And a March shutdown cliff could coincide with several other major issues on Congress’ agenda next year, including another debt ceiling deadline and the expiration of Trump-era tax cuts.

Instead, leading appropriators, including Republicans like House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.), are pushing to wrap up fiscal 2024 funding by the end of the calendar year, clearing the decks for the next Congress in January.