$1.2T Spending Plan Unveiled Ahead of Saturday Shutdown Deadline

WASHINGTON — House and Senate leaders released an over-$1.2 trillion, six-bill appropriations package early Thursday morning, giving lawmakers less than 48 hours to pass it ahead of the midnight Friday deadline to avoid a partial government shutdown.

The 1,012-page package, which was released just before 3 a.m. EDT this morning, covers military spending, funding for the departments of State, Treasury, Homeland Security and the Internal Revenue Service.

It also provides funding for congressional operations and scores of federal health, education and labor programs. 

The plan now is for the package to get a floor vote in the House Friday morning, followed by a vote in the Senate later in the day or early Friday night.

During a briefing with reporters on Wednesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., expressed confidence that scenario would come to pass and that the passage of another stopgap spending measure would be unnecessary.

“That is my hope,” he said with a smile.

If he proves correct, Congress will end Friday having finally wrapped up its budgeting for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1.

President Joe Biden has already promised to sign the package into law as soon as it reaches his desk.

Lawmakers had hoped to get the text of the package sometime late Wednesday. Its publication was reportedly delayed by a last minute squabble over border security funding.

As Thursday morning dawned, however, members of both political parties were talking up the “wins” they’d secured in the final deal.

Among other things, the package would increase Defense Department spending by some 27 billion, while keeping funding for the non-defense parts of the government included at roughly the same level as last year.

Johnson said the Pentagon funding represented a “serious commitment” to strengthening the national defense.

Democrats meanwhile lauded the $1 billion in new spending the measure allocates for child care and Head Start programs along with his provision of more aid for schools that serve low-income students.

They were also pleased to secure substantial funding for a number of Biden’s priorities, including $120 million for cancer research, $100 million for Alzheimer’s research and $1 billion that’s been allocated to continue the military’s adaptation to climate change.

Democrats were also pleased by what’s not in the spending plan. Among the items they blocked were new limits on women’s access to reproductive health care and a Republican effort to eliminate Title X family planning and teen pregnancy prevention grants.

Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee said in a statement that the spending package builds on the premise that “there’s no better investment than in the American people.”

“We defeated outlandish cuts that would have been a gut punch for American families and our economy — and we fought off scores of extreme policies that would have restricted Americans’ fundamental freedoms, hurt consumers while giving giant corporations an unfair advantage and turned back the clock on historic climate action,” she said.

“From day one of this process, I said there would be no extreme, far-right riders to restrict women’s reproductive freedoms — and there aren’t,” Murray continued. 

“This package will give families some extra breathing room — and help continue America’s historic economic recovery … This bill protects our investments in Americans’ health and in students at every stage of their education. It will propel cutting-edge medical research to discover new treatments and cures, and it makes certain we keep up our efforts to address the mental health crisis and the opioid epidemic, including with new investments to stop the flow of fentanyl,” Murray said.

But that’s not to say the measure doesn’t include much the Republicans are happy about.

For instance, a summary released by GOP appropriators credits Johnson with “dramatically” reducing the use of “off-book resources and budgetary gimmicks,” steps they said would save American taxpayers more than $200 billion over the next decade.

They also note that the measure is more than $100 billion below what the president requested, and assert it represents the first overall cut in no-defense, non-Veterans Affairs spending in nearly 10 years.

In the last round of talks, this past weekend, the Republicans were also able to secure an agreement to increase immigration detention capacity to 42,000 people — an increase of about 24%.

The spending plan also includes funding for the hiring of 22,000 more border patrol agents, the same number House Republicans had called for in H.R. 2, the immigration and border security measure passed last year, but which the Senate never considered.

The package also includes a 25% increase in funding for new technology to help thwart illegal border crossings. Meanwhile, it cuts funding for nongovernmental organizations that provide shelter and services to migrants. 

In a statement accompanying the release of the package, House Appropriations Chair Kay Granger, R-Texas, said “House Republicans made a commitment to strategically increase defense spending, make targeted cuts to overfunded non-defense programs and pull back wasteful spending from previous years. I am proud to say that we have delivered on that promise, and this bill is proof.

“Given that the world is becoming more dangerous, we wanted to send a strong message that we will do everything in our power to protect the American people and defend our interests,” she continued. “This bill funds our highest national security priorities — it invests in a more modern, innovative, and ready fighting force, continues our strong support for our great ally Israel and provides key border enforcement resources. 

“At the same time, we made cuts to programs that have nothing to do with our national security and pulled back billions from the administration,” Granger said.

Johnson agreed with Granger’s assessments, suggesting that Congressional Republicans had “achieved significant conservative policy wins, rejected extreme Democrat proposals, and imposed substantial cuts to wasteful agencies and programs while strengthening border security and national defense.”

The defense portion of the package includes a 5.2% pay increase for military members — the largest increase they’ve seen in decades.

It also includes $500 million for Israeli missile defense, along with its annual allotment of $3.3 billion in funding to purchase U.S.-made arms.

Republicans are also pointing out the state-foreign operations portion of the spending measure continues to block funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Refugees in the Near East, an entity also known as UNRWA. 

The freeze on already allocated funding and absence of any new money in the budget for the relief agency stems from Israeli allegations that some of its workers participated in the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Hamas.

Not everyone is happy with the proposal. Conservative House Republicans are livid over some of the measure’s provisions as well as Johnson’s apparent willingness to negotiate in good faith with the Democrats.

Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., lost his job for bringing a stopgap spending measure to the floor last September that flew in the face of demands of his party’s hard right.

Though Johnson has adhered to the spending and debt limit deal McCarthy struck with Biden last summer, he also managed to eke out significant “wins” for his side, especially when it came to the last minute border provisions.

He also managed to avoid foisting a massive omnibus spending bill on the chamber, instead utilizing a so-called “laddered” stopgap approach that resulted in a two-tiered budget deadline that appeared to somewhat smooth the negotiation process.

Dan can be reached at [email protected] and at https://twitter.com/DanMcCue