(CNN) — Congress appears on track to avert a partial government shutdown by the end of the week, but both chambers still need to pass a short-term funding extension before a Friday deadline and there is no room for error.
Late Wednesday evening, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announced that the Senate has reached an agreement to vote on Thursday afternoon on a continuing resolution, or CR, to continue funding for the federal government.
“We have just agreed to lock in an agreement and pass a bill tomorrow that will fund the government, and avoid an unnecessary government shutdown. This CR will give Congress time to continue working on the appropriations process to fund the government for the rest of the fiscal year,” Schumer said. “We hope that the House will take up this bill before the Friday deadline with bipartisan support.”
He continued, “I hope, I truly hope, we will see the same bipartisanship we have seen tonight in the Senate continue as we tackle the very important supplemental and appropriation bills before us.”
The House will next need to take up the measure and pass it once it is approved by the Senate.
In a rare event, lawmakers are confronting not one but two government shutdown deadlines early this year – on January 19 and February 2.
The short-term funding extension sets up two new funding deadlines on March 1 and March 8. The stopgap measure will provide more time for full-year appropriations bills to be negotiated and passed.
The Senate voted to advance the funding extension on Tuesday evening with a procedural vote of 68 to 13.
Bipartisan support will be needed to get the bill across the finish line in the House as well as Speaker Mike Johnson faces an extremely narrow majority and pushback from his right flank.
Johnson has faced fierce criticism from conservatives over a topline spending deal he struck with Schumer, which would set spending at close to $1.66 trillion overall. Conservatives were also quick to criticize the proposal for a short-term funding extension after it was announced.
“This is what surrender looks like,” the far-right House Freedom Caucus posted on X.
Johnson has defended the topline agreement and said in a statement Sunday that the short-term spending bill “is required to complete what House Republicans are working hard to achieve: an end to governance by omnibus, meaningful policy wins, and better stewardship of American tax dollars.”
In addition to the effort to avert a shutdown, a group of Senate negotiators have been working to try to strike a deal on border security that could unlock passage of aid to Ukraine and Israel.
Top congressional leaders emerged from a Wednesday meeting with President Joe Biden at the White House hopeful that a deal on a national security supplemental aid package can be reached.
If a deal is reached in the Senate, however, its fate in the House will be uncertain. A number of House Republicans have warned that they don’t believe a Senate compromise on border security would be adequate to address the issues at the border and would be ready to reject such a measure.
The-CNN-Wire
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