WASHINGTON — A brewing battle over how to finance the federal government is about to intensify this week as Congress returns from a two-week recess.
The House’s Republican majority is on a collision course with the Senate as appropriators in both houses present conflicting versions of a sweeping package, which must be signed into law by September 30 to avoid a government shutdown.
Unlike the House, Senate leaders have moved down a bipartisan path and key senators say they intend to assert themselves after falling behind in recent debt-ceiling negotiations.
However, divisions over US aid to Ukraine and the inclusion of GOP-backed abortion restrictions and anti-LGBTQ policies have further complicated work on the bill due to pass, with a recess August of a month which gives Congress limited time to craft it.
Seeking to appease ultra-conservative members who are angry about the budget deal in the debt ceiling deal, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and House Appropriations Chair Kay Granger, R-Texas, have announced that they will approve funds at levels lower than those established in recent law.
Democrats have criticized it as a violation of the agreement.
“What Chairman McCarthy is doing is increasing the risks of a government shutdown,” said Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, which writes funding bills. government along with its counterpart in the Chamber.
“Clearly, it is a violation of the agreement that Chairman McCarthy signed with the president,” said Van Hollen, who accused McCarthy of “catering to his far-right members.” “It’s clearly going to create some tough times.”
The House’s top Republicans, who voted a series of appropriations bills out of committee before the July 4 recess, say they want to redefine how spending deals are perceived.
Granger called the debt-ceiling budget deal “a ceiling, not a floor” for the next round of government funding. “That is why I will take this opportunity to mark the appropriations bills” at the lowest level that was set in fiscal year 2022.
Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, said House conservatives are trying to right perceived wrongs in the debt limit battle, including funding levels they believe were too high.
“We have big disagreements about how and what happened regarding the increase in the debt ceiling. So now we’re trying to get the band back together,” Roy said.
In addition to policies that pursue abortion and LGBTQ rights, House Democrats have criticized other measures that Republicans added to their appropriations bills, including cuts to rural energy funding, a ban on military diversity programs and the repeal of clean energy tax breaks under the Inflation Reduction Act. Act.
It remains to be seen how firmly McCarthy will insist on lower spending levels and conservative policy add-ons. Some in the House GOP see it as a first bite before negotiations with the Senate begin in earnest. Looming over McCarthy is the need to hold his slim majority together to protect his position as a speaker, and ultra-conservatives tend to push for the tougher negotiations.
While House Republicans battle Democrats, the Senate is taking a different approach by pushing legislation within agreed limits and avoiding policies that are poison pills for either party.
“In the Senate, we are working diligently through regular order on a bipartisan basis to advance appropriations bills,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, DN.Y., wrote to his colleagues in a Sunday letter describing a busy July schedule.
Senate Appropriations Chair Patty Murray, D-W., and Vice President Susan Collins, R-Maine, issued a joint statement pledging to move “full steam ahead and in a bipartisan manner.”
They also vowed to assert the power of the Senate, a sign that the funding debate will play out differently from the debt limit bill.
“We are both committed to ensuring that the voice of the Senate is heard through the appointments process and we look forward to a busy summer of increases and continued bipartisan deliberations,” Murray and Collins said.
Murray made it clear that the GOP’s push to fund the military at a higher level while cutting national funding was not a start for the Senate.
“As this process moves forward, I am going to insist that the programs that families depend on every day receive the same kind of attention and urgency that we consistently see for the Pentagon,” he told a recent committee meeting when members They unanimously approved the measures. for military, veterans, agriculture, and the Food and Drug Administration.
McCarthy also disagrees with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell over aid to Ukraine. Many House conservatives are skeptical of continuing to fund the country’s defense against Russia’s war, but McConnell has been adamant about staying involved.
In a meeting with service members at Fort Knox last Wednesday, McConnell said the cause represents “the biggest thing that’s happening in the world right now, which is defeating the Russians in the Ukraine.” He said that while some believe the war is not important to the United States, “that’s not my opinion” and that “it’s not the majority opinion of Republicans in the Senate and neither are Democrats.”
It will be a busy September, with Congress also facing a September 30 deadline to agree on a new farm bill and reauthorize the Federal Aviation Administration. And tensions over government funding could cool the climate for negotiations.
“They’re reneging on what they bargained for,” Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, DN.H., said of House Republicans. “Why negotiate with people if they are not going to deliver what they have negotiated?”
