U.S. Representative Greg Pence. Friday, February 9, 2024. (Tom Russo | Daily Reporter)
WASHINGTON — Rep. Greg Pence, R-Ind., voted in favor of a $1.2 trillion package of spending bills on Friday just a few hours before funding for some key federal agencies is set to expire, pushing any threats of a government shutdown to the fall.
The bill passed by a vote of 286-134 and now moves to the Senate, where leadership hopes for a final vote later Friday, The Associated Press reported. More than 70% of the money would go to defense.
Pence, who is not seeking re-election this year, has gone back and forth in his votes on spending packages in recent months, congressional records show.
Last month, Pence voted against a short-term spending measure that would avoid a shutdown for parts of the federal government, including the Pentagon and the departments of Homeland Security and Agriculture, among others.
Pence had previously voted in favor of short-term spending measures to keep the government open in January, November and September, according to congressional records.
Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., brought the bill up under a streamlined process that required two-thirds support for approval, according to wire reports. The bill narrowly met that threshold with more Republicans voting against it than voting for it, which could spell difficulties for Johnson in the weeks ahead.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., initiated an effort to oust Johnson as the House began the vote but held off on further action until the House returns in two weeks. A similar political dynamic led to the removal of the last Republican speaker, Kevin McCarthy, of California.
The vote breakdown showed 101 Republicans voting for the bill and 112 voting against it. Meanwhile, 185 Democrats voted for the bill and 22 against.
Johnson broke up this fiscal year’s spending bills into two parts as House Republicans revolted against what has become an annual practice of asking them to vote for one massive, complex bill with little time to review it or face a shutdown, according to the AP. Johnson viewed that as a breakthrough. Still, the bill was clearly unpopular with most Republicans, who viewed it as containing too few of their policy priorities and as spending too much.
It’s taken lawmakers six months into the current fiscal year to get near the finish line, the process slowed by conservatives who pushed for more policy mandates and steeper spending cuts than a Democratic-led Senate or White House would consider, according to wire reports. The impasse required several short-term, stopgap spending bills to keep agencies funded as negotiations continued.
Democratic leaders sold the bill to members by emphasizing the hundreds of policy mandates they were able to keep out of the bill and the staving off of deep spending cuts.
The first package of full-year spending bills, which funded the departments of Veterans Affairs, Agriculture and the Interior, among others, cleared Congress two weeks ago with just hours to spare before funding expired for those agencies. Now, lawmakers are considering the second package under a similar scenario.
The 1,012-page bill also funds the departments of Homeland Security, Health and Human Services, Labor and others.
Nondefense spending will be relatively flat compared with the prior year, though some, such as the Environmental Protection Agency, are taking a hit, and many agencies will not see their budgets keep up with inflation, according to wire reports.
When combining the two packages, discretionary spending for the budget year will come to about $1.66 trillion. That does not include programs such as Social Security and Medicare, or financing the country’s rising debt.
House Republicans were able to secure a provision that prohibits funding through March 2025 for the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, which is the main supplier of food, water and shelter to civilians in Gaza.
Republicans are insisting on cutting off funding to the agency after Israel alleged that a dozen employees of the agency were involved in the attack Hamas conducted in Israel on Oct. 7.
But the prohibition does concern some lawmakers because many relief agencies say there is no way to replace its ability to deliver the humanitarian assistance that the United States and others are trying to send to Gaza, where one-quarter of the 2.3 million residents are starving.
To win over support from Republicans, Johnson has also touted some of the spending increases secured for about 8,000 more detention beds for migrants awaiting their immigration proceedings or removal from the country, according to wire reports. That’s about a 24% increase from current levels. Also, GOP leadership highlighted more money to hire about 2,000 Border Patrol agents.
Democrats, meanwhile, are boasting of a $1 billion increase for Head Start programs and new child care centers for military families. They also played up a $120 million increase in funding for cancer research and a $100 million increase for Alzheimer’s research.
The spending in the bill largely tracks with an agreement that then-Speaker McCarthy worked out with the White House in May 2023, which restricted spending for two years and suspended the debt ceiling into January 2025 so the federal government could continue paying its bills.
Shalanda Young, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, told lawmakers Thursday that last year’s agreement, which became the Fiscal Responsibility Act, will save the federal government about $1 trillion over the coming decade.
Members of both parties expressed frustration with how long the process has taken and that the end result was what so many had predicted, according to wire reports. They warned all along that Republicans would not get the vast majority of policy mandates they were seeking or cut spending further than what McCarthy and the White House had agreed upon last year.
— The Associated Press contributed to this story.
