Shutdown Workaround

Looks like now that President Obama isn't in office any more, suddenly Republicans are a whole lot more open to passing clean continuing budget resolutions these days.

The House on Thursday completed its work on the annual appropriations bills for 2018, ahead of expected negotiations at the end of this year to keep the government funded.

By a vote of 211-198, the House passed a $1.2 trillion package of spending bills to fund wide swaths of the federal government, ranging from the Department of Homeland Security to the Environmental Protection Agency.

“This is a big day,” Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said, touting the House's use of regular order to pass the 12 bills.

“This is the first time the House has done that since 2009,” he said.

The package included eight new bills, plus four previously passed appropriations bills that advanced through the House in July. Regular order for appropriations typically involved passing each of the bills individually, not in groups of 4 or 8. 

Congress sent a three-month government funding extension to President Trump’s desk last week to avoid a government shutdown on Oct. 1. That means Congress will have to finalize government spending for 2018 in December. 

“This is the next step in the process, but it is not the end. Funding these important federal responsibilities and keeping the government open is our constitutional duty to the people we serve, and I look forward to the final completion of all these critical bills,” House Appropriations Committee Chairman Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-N.J.). 

The passage of all 12 of the annual appropriations bills before the end of the fiscal year is a first for Republicans who have not been able to move them all in the same time frame in recent years.

Of course, getting the House bills through the Senate won't happen, but hey, at least Paul Ryan finally figured out how legislation works, right?