Senate passes bill to avert government shutdown before midterm elections

The Senate overwhelmingly approved a measure early Saturday to fund the government through Dec. 11 and temporarily block the White House from giving political appointees more control over federal grants.

The 90-6 vote came after Republican leaders worked for hours through the night to reach an agreement that would allow them to vote on multiple priorities before leaving town for the five-week August recess.

Just 6 senators — Bill Cassidy (R., La.), Tim Kaine (D., Va.), Ed Markey (D., Mass.), Rand Paul (R., Ky.), Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) and Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) — opposed the funding measure, which would avoid a politically perilous shutdown ahead of the Nov. 3 midterm elections. But it still must be approved by the Republican-controlled House, where the appetite for rebuking the White House on grant funding was unclear.

The bill, like a similar House measure passed last month, would fund the government past a Sept. 30 deadline. The Senate bill also would finance a number of requests from the White House, including funds for housing and nutrition programs. And it would extend expiring authorization for veterans’ healthcare programs.

But the big difference between the House and Senate bills is the Senate’s decision to include a provision regarding federal grants. That provision would temporarily block the White House budget office from adopting a rule change to give political appointees more power over discretionary grant funding, diminishing the power of independent peer reviewers.

Proposed in May, the rule change would require political appointees to review grants before they are awarded to ensure they advance the president’s priorities and do not support projects the administration opposes, including those that “fund, promote, encourage, subsidize, or facilitate” diversity, equity, and inclusion principles or “deny the biological reality of … the sex binary.” It also would give agencies the power to end grants at any time.

Trump administration officials say the rule would add needed oversight to federal grant-making, ensuring federal funds aren’t wasted or misused. But Senate Appropriations Committee Chairperson Susan Collins (R., Maine) said it has the “potential to politicize grants and harm small, rural communities, families, and biomedical research.”

Collins and Sen. Patty Murray (Wash.), the lead Democratic appropriator, worked together to craft the bipartisan Senate measure. House lawmakers could take it up after they return from recess at the end of August.

If the provisions added by the Senate draw backlash, however, lawmakers could quickly find themselves in a rush to negotiate a compromise before the government runs out of funding on Sept. 30.

Senate Republicans also initially hoped to hold a vote on a separate $150 billion budget framework to help fund the Iran war and impose new restrictions on voting ahead of the midterm elections, but Republicans scrapped that plan late Friday night.

Republicans grappled during a two-hour closed-door meeting Friday night with whether to take up the budget framework, with which several Republicans had expressed concerns.

A small group of Republicans spoke with Trump after the meeting and agreed to push off the vote until September, according to Sen. Ron Johnson (R., Wis.), the chairperson of the Senate Budget Committee.

“We’re in total agreement,” Johnson told reporters. “There was no argument about it.”

The Senate also agreed early Saturday morning to vote in September on legislation to regulate college sports led by Sens. Ted Cruz (R., Texas) and Maria Cantwell (D., Wash.). The back-and-forth over whether to vote on the bill before leaving for recess was one of several interlocking issues that kept the Senate in session late into the night.

Senate Democrats blocked a bill during the early Saturday vote series that would require voters to show photo identification. Senate Republicans held a procedural vote on the measure in lieu of voting on the Save America Act, a more expansive bill that would impose stricter election rules which President Donald Trump had demanded the Senate pass before leaving Washington. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R., S.D.) has said repeatedly that the Save America Act does not have enough support to pass.

The decision to postpone the vote on the budget resolution came hours after Republicans unveiled the $150 billion spending framework, which was significantly larger than a $95 billion plan approved last month by the House. Johnson said Senate leaders intend to spend only about $105 billion.

The smaller number tracks closely with the House package. Both would allot $60 billion to the Pentagon, which faces an urgent budget shortfall caused largely by the war with Iran, and $13 billion for intelligence needs related to the war. They also would provide $12 billion for farmers struggling to keep pace with inflation.

Senate Republicans will seek to use up to $20 billion for election-related measures, Johnson told the Washington Post. That’s twice the amount provided in the House package. Republicans hope to use that money to pass some parts of the Save America Act, although it’s unclear how much of it would be allowed under reconciliation, the special process Republicans would use to pass the bill without Democratic votes.

The delay in considering the measure will give Republicans time to revise their plan and win over skeptical senators.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R., N.C.) has said he will not support a package that included elements of the Save America Act. Sens. Susan Collins (R., Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (R., Alaska) also signaled opposition to the budget resolution, while Sen. Bill Cassidy (R., La.) complained about the lack of budget cuts to cover the cost of the new spending and avoid adding to the nation’s $39.9 trillion debt.

Sen. Roger Wicker (R., Miss.), the chairpersons of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and other Republicans, meanwhile, have called for increasing the amount of funding for the Pentagon.

The budget framework is the first step in the reconciliation process, which would allow Republicans to evade a Democratic filibuster and move the bill with a simple majority instead of 60 votes. But both chambers must approve identical budget frameworks to set funding levels before beginning work on the actual legislation — and time is running out before the midterms.

The Senate is set to recess until Sept. 14 and is scheduled to be in session for only three weeks before recessing again. Congress already faces a towering agenda during those weeks.