Averting shutdown top of Schumer’s to-do list as Senate returns – Washington Examiner
As Congress returns after a month-long recess, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is prioritizing the avoidance of a government shutdown, alongside advancing President Biden’s judicial nominees. The deadline for funding is September 30, after which the government will run out of money unless a spending measure, likely a stopgap bill, is passed. House Republicans are pushing for a six-month continuing resolution, but they also want to attach a contentious proof-of-citizenship voting bill to the negotiations, which Schumer and the White House oppose, threatening a veto.
This situation is complicated by divisions within the Republican Party, where some leaders fear that attaching the voting bill could lead to a shutdown. Moreover, there is pressure on House Speaker Mike Johnson to use leverage to weaken Democrats’ influence ahead of potential GOP gains in the upcoming elections.
Additionally, Congress faces a deadline to pass a new farm bill, with the potential need for short-term extensions due to past failures in reaching a long-term agreement. The landscape is fraught with rivalry as both parties navigate the impending fiscal deadlines and partisan legislation, all while gearing up for the November elections.
Avoiding government shutdown at top of Schumer’s agenda with Senate’s return
Congress returns Monday after more than a month of lawmakers being on August recess to conduct business and campaign in their home states and districts.
The Democratic-led Senate will immediately continue to advance President Joe Biden’s judicial nominees, but Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) will have a far more urgent task: working with House Republicans to avert a government shutdown.
Congress has through Sept. 30 to pass some sort of spending measure before the federal government runs out of money, which is mostly likely to take the form of a stopgap bill known as a continuing resolution, or CR, as work continues on the fiscal 2025 budget. Funding expires at midnight on Oct. 1.
Congress’s last working day until mid-November is Sept. 27, another lengthy break to give lawmakers more campaign time ahead of the Nov. 5 elections. That leaves members less than 15 working days to strike a deal in both chambers.
House Republicans want a six-month CR to take them into March in hopes of having a GOP-controlled Congress and White House. Further complicating the government shutdown fight is the House GOP’s push for a proof-of-citizenship voting bill to be attached, which Schumer has warned is a nonstarter. The White House has also threatened a veto.
“As we have said each time we’ve had a CR, the only way to get things done is in a bipartisan way, and that is what has happened every time,” Schumer said.
The citizenship legislation is even dividing the GOP. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and other Senate GOP leaders are resisting an effort by hard-line House counterparts to tack on the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, or SAVE Act, out of fear it could trigger a shutdown.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has faced mounting pressure from his right flank to “use our leverage” to weaken Democrats’ ability during Biden’s final months to pass a fiscal year spending bill in the lame-duck period after the elections but before the new Congress. Republicans hope the delay could allow them to punt until former President Donald Trump would be back in the White House.
Democrats are eyeing a CR to take them into the lame-duck session in late November or early December.
Senate Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray (D-WA) has previously assailed the SAVE Act as a “partisan scare tactic.”
“Demanding outrageous partisan poison pills is a nonstarter,” Murray said. “We’ve seen this movie before, and we know how it ends.”
Critics of the SAVE Act say it is redundant because federal elections already require proof of citizenship for registration. But some states or municipalities do allow noncitizens to cast ballots in state or local races.
Congress also has a Sept. 30 deadline for the new farm bill, a legislative package that’s supposed to be passed every five years to govern the country’s agriculture, nutrition, conservation, and forestry policies.
Last year, lawmakers enacted a one-year extension of the 2018 farm bill over the inability to reach a multiyear deal. Another short-term extension will likely be needed this year.
House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington (R-TX) has floated extending it by a few months into the lame-duck session.
Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) has again crafted significant portions of the farm bill, legislation that she’s previously played a major role in writing and ushering through Congress. But with her retirement from Congress this term, it is yet to be seen if she’ll be able to cast a vote on the measure and see her latest efforts come to fruition while still in office.
In the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s annual report on household food security, the agency found that in 2023 the number of food insecure households rose from 12.8% in 2022 to 13.5% last year. Its 2024 Farm Income Forecast showed that farm incomes are set to fall for the second year in a row.
Stabenow called the trends “absolutely unacceptable” and that the reports bolstered the need for a new Farm Bill.
“This has always been the foundation of the Farm Bill, pairing the farm and family coalitions together and working toward a common goal—not pitting one against the other,” she said in a statement. “When the Senate returns next week, I am determined to do everything in my power to pass a Farm Bill that keeps families fed, farmers farming, and rural communities strong.”
Cami Mondeaux contributed to this report.
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