Senate expected to vote to approve government funding to avert shutdown
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By Clare Foran and Ted Barrett, CNN
The Senate is expected to hold a final passage vote Thursday to approve a short-term government funding extension that would prevent a shutdown at the end of the week.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announced plans for a vote at 1:45 p.m. ET for final passage of the stop-gap government funding bill.
Government funding is currently on track to expire Friday at midnight, but this stopgap bill would extend funding through December 16, setting up a potential funding fight at the end of the year instead.
The House would next need to pass the measure once it is approved by the Senate before it can be sent to President Joe Biden for his signature.
Lawmakers have expressed confidence there will not be a shutdown, but it is typical of Congress in recent years to run right up against funding deadlines.
In part, that’s because the opposing parties find it easier to reach last-minute deals to stave off a shutdown under tight time pressure.
This time around, neither party wants to be blamed for a shutdown — especially so close to the consequential November midterm elections where control of Congress is at stake and as Democrats and Republicans are both trying to make their case to voters that they should be in the majority. Lawmakers up for reelection are also eager to finish up work on Capitol Hill so they can return to their home states to campaign.
In addition to money to keep government agencies afloat, the short-term funding measure unveiled earlier this week provides around $12 billion for Ukraine as it continues to face Russian military attack, and would require the Pentagon to report on how US dollars have been spent there. The aid to Ukraine is a bipartisan priority.
The continuing resolution also would extend an expiring FDA user fee program for five years.
The Senate took a key vote to advance the government funding measure earlier this week after West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin dropped a request to include a controversial permitting reform proposal that had come under sharp criticism from Republicans and liberals.
The plan would have expedited the permitting and environmental review process for energy projects — including a major pipeline that would cross through Manchin’s home state of West Virginia. Senate Democratic leaders had been pushing to pass it along with government funding as a result of a deal cut to secure Manchin’s support for Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act — a key priority for the party — which passed over the summer.
But Republicans warned they would vote against the effort to tie permitting reform to the funding extension, in part because they did not want to reward Manchin over his support for the Inflation Reduction Act.
At the same time, some liberal members of the Senate Democratic caucus had expressed concern over environmental impacts.
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CNN’s Manu Raju contributed to this report.
