Schumer announces step toward spending stopgap: ‘Crystal clear’ CR is needed

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) announced Thursday that senators will vote next week on a short-term funding measure to avoid a government shutdown, saying it’s “crystal clear” that Congress won’t be able to pass the regular spending bills by the Jan. 19 deadline.

Schumer said senators will vote after Martin Luther King Jr. Day on a shell bill to keep the government open past the end of next week.

Funding for military construction and the departments of Veterans Affairs; Agriculture; Energy; Transportation; and Housing and Urban Development will expire Jan. 19. Funding for other departments and agencies will expire Feb. 2.

“The most immediate need in the calendar is avoiding a government shutdown and fully funding the government for fiscal year 2024,” he said, warning: “A shutdown is looming over us.”

“Unfortunately, it has become crystal clear that it will take more than a week to finish the appropriations process. So, today I am taking the first procedural step for the Senate to pass a temporary extension of government funding so the government does not shut down,” he said.

Schumer, however, did not reveal how long the temporary funding stopgap would last or whether it would cover the departments facing a funding lapse Feb. 2.

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) last year insisted on splitting up federal departments into two groups pegged to different funding deadlines, aiming to lesson the chance Congress has to pass one giant omnibus appropriations package to avoid a shutdown.

Johnson also declared in November that he was “done” with short-term continuing resolutions (CR) that punt spending decisions a few weeks or months into the future.

The Speaker would likely have to swallow another short-term CR to avoid a partial shutdown at the end of next week.

Senate GOP leaders acknowledged Tuesday that another short-term funding measure would need to be passed this month.

“Obviously we’re going to have to pass a CR,” Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told reporters earlier in the week.

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) said Wednesday that he expects the CR will extend funding for all federal departments and agencies past the Presidents Day recess in February, setting up a new round of deadlines in March.