The Senate voted without debate Thursday to extend the deadline through Wednesday to allow for more discussion.
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The U.S. House of Representatives was expected Friday to pass a measure that would keep the government open for five more days and avoid a federal shutdown.
Congress had until December 11 to pass the appropriations bill to fund the government. Those included Republican proposals to lift a ban on crude oil exports and tighten screening of Syrians seeking refuge in the United States.
“Republicans’ insistence on including risky, harmful policies in the spending bill has halted progress”, Nita Lowey of NY, the top Democrat on the appropriations panel, said.
“This is one where we were served up a particular deck of cards, if you will, and we’ve got to play it in order to keep from getting a shutdown”.
Even the later deadline will be tough for Congress to meet. “The Democrats aren’t going to get everything they want in negotiations”, House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin, told reporters Thursday.
Legislation can take longer to clear the Senate, where a single lawmaker can delay the process.
Ryan said earlier in the week he wasn’t “going to put a deadline on it”, the AP reported. But there is little margin for error since this latest stopgap bill expires on Wednesday night so it’s likely that Congress will need to pass another short-term bill next week. “I want to make sure that these negotiations are done well and done right, and not by some arbitrary deadline”.
Additionally, a bipartisan effort from NY area lawmakers to reauthorize funding for 9/11 first responder healthcare is also a part of ongoing spending negotiations.
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House Democrats, looking to draw attention to their push for gun control legislation, emphasized a new demand as they announced their opposition to any bill that doesn’t undo a longstanding provision that has been interpreted to block the Centers for Disease Control from conducting research on gun violence.
