The Senate on Friday cleared the House’s continuing resolution funding the government through Sept. 30, narrowly avoiding a government shutdown.
The CR passed 54-46 with the support of two Democrats, but the crucial vote came earlier, when nine Democrats and Maine independent Angus King crossed the aisle to support a cloture motion needed to bring the bill to a final vote. The cloture vote passed, 62-38, with two votes to spare.
All week, Senate Democrats had publicly and privately stewed over whether to back the CR or shut the government down.
Thursday night, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., announced he would back the CR, after he determined it was the lesser of two evils. Already, the move has garnered backlash from New Yorkers and House Democrats.
Schumer argued that allowing the government to shut down would have given President Donald Trump and Elon Musk more power to cut federal agencies and employees. Some Democrats have also expressed concern that in the process of getting out of a shutdown, programs and agencies could remain closed.
“It’s a hard decision ... it's like two horrible things,” said Sen. John Hickenlooper, D-Colo.
Ultimately, Hickenlooper and most other Democrats opted to oppose the CR. Ahead of the vote, he said he felt going into a shutdown was better than the CR in the long term but he respected other Democrats’ decision.
In order to secure the 60 necessary votes to invoke cloture on the CR, the Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., allowed a vote on four amendments, all four of which failed to get adopted.
One amendment by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who opposed the CR, was designed to force colleagues to go on the record supporting the cuts to U.S. Agency for International Development programs driven by Elon Musk's DOGE initiative. Farm-state Republicans helped sink the amendment, 27-73.
Seven GOP members of the Senate Agriculture Committee, including Chairman John Boozman of Arkansas and Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota, voted against the Paul amendment.
The DOGE-led gutting of USAID led to a slowdown in the Food for Peace program – some commodities are now moving through the UN World Food Program – and triggered uncertainty for the future of therapeutic foods that are used to treat malnutrition in regions wracked by hunger.
The continuing resolution largely continues funding departments and programs in line with fiscal year 2024 levels with a small increase at USDA for the Women, Infants and Children nutrition assistance program.
There also are some cuts to USDA rural development programs, Army Corps of Engineers construction funding and USDA's Natural Resources Conservation Service, according to a House Appropriations Committee Democrats fact sheet.
The Agriculture portion of the continuing resolution that includes FDA and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission as well as USDA would be funded at $26.2 billion for fiscal 2025, a $400 million increase over the FY24 funding level, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
The Interior and Environment portion, which includes the Interior Department, EPA and the Forest Service, would get a $2.3 billion increase to $38.6 billion.
The CR includes an extension on Medicare telehealth flexibilities that would have otherwise expired at the end of the month. The flexibilities were first included in the public health emergency declaration following the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic.
These expanded provisions have been beneficial for rural communities that often face greater shortages in health care providers and longer distances to care. Rural health advocates have pushed for these flexibilities to be made permanent, or at least extended ahead of the deadline.
In a disappointment to the ethanol industry and pro-ethanol lawmakers, the CR does not include a measure on year-round E15. Back in December when Congress was again working on a funding bill, that measure was included but later cut.
Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., said she was disappointed a bill she helped introduce that would have secured year-round E15 was not included in the CR.
“It's a good bill. It has broad support, bipartisan, bicameral, variety of stakeholders, from petroleum to refineries,” Fischer said.”It’s a great bill, we need it, our ag producers need it. Our consumers need it.”
Fischer said she was unsure what vehicle the bill could be included in now, but lawmakers will keep looking.
When the House voted on the measure earlier this week, all but one Democrat opposed the measure. Democratic leaders, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., unexpectedly returned to Capitol Hill Friday afternoon following a caucus retreat in Virginia to hold a press conference urging Senate colleagues to oppose the measure.
Democrats in both chambers pushed for an alternative, short-term CR to allow appropriators to finish full funding bills. But House Republican leadership signaled early on that this was off the table as the funding deadline loomed.
“I support the thirty-day short-term extension to keep the government open to complete bipartisan negotiations on the actual budget,” said Senate Agriculture Committee ranking member Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn. “
I will not support the partisan proposal in part because it does not include Minnesota infrastructure projects, undercuts medical care and research, and makes major changes to reduce veterans’ health care, including for those exposed to burn pits.”
Philip Brasher contributed to this report.
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