The House approved a more than $1 trillion spending package that ends the partial government shutdown, passing 217 to 214 with 21 Democrats joining Republicans. President Trump signed the measure into law shortly after its passage.
The legislation funds several of the government’s largest departments through the end of the fiscal year in September, including the Pentagon, the Department of Health and Human Services, Transportation, Education, and Housing and Urban Development. It also includes a stopgap measure that funds the Department of Homeland Security through Feb. 13.
Lawmakers intend to use the 10-day window to negotiate changes to federal immigration enforcement after the deaths of Renee Macklin Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis last month. Democrats are pressing for reforms such as requiring body-worn cameras, forbidding officers from hiding their identities, and mandating judicial warrants for enforcement operations. While body-worn cameras have bipartisan support, Republicans have resisted other Democratic demands, setting up difficult negotiations.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune and other top Republicans have indicated another short-term homeland security bill will likely be needed. Even without another stopgap, Trump’s immigration crackdown will continue; Congress approved $75 billion for Immigration and Customs Enforcement over four years in last year’s Republican tax and spending bill.
The deal averted a longer shutdown. Before the second deadly shooting by immigration officers in Minneapolis, the remaining federal funding bills were expected to pass with bipartisan support. Lawmakers were eager to avoid another lapse after last fall’s record-long, 43-day shutdown, which had ended with partial funding agreements through September and a short-term extension through the end of January for the rest of the government.
Democratic appropriators praised the final spending package for preventing deep cuts the administration had sought. For example, the administration had proposed roughly a 50% reduction to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; the final bill keeps the agency’s funding essentially flat.
The House had passed those final measures and sent them to the Senate, but after the Minneapolis shooting Senate Democrats pledged to withhold votes on homeland security funding without reforms. In the eleventh hour, Senate Democrats reached a deal with the White House to separate funding for most of the government from the homeland security bill. With the House in recess last week and unable to immediately approve the separated measures, parts of the federal government briefly ran out of money. With the House back in session this week, the agreement proved tenuous in a chamber where Republicans hold a narrow majority.
