House and Senate lawmakers are racing to finalize and pass a massive government funding bill that would also send billions in new aid to Ukraine. Congress must pass the sweeping bill, which would fund the government through the end of September, and President Joe Biden has to sign it before the end of Friday in order to prevent another government shutdown. In the alternative, Congress will need to pass another short-term continuing resolution to keep the government funded as negotiations continue. The government funding bill is tied to the status of roughly $10 billion in aid in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine because lawmakers are expected to attach the money to the larger legislation to help speed up its path through Congress and to President Biden’s desk. “The Congress intends to enact this emergency funding this week as part of our omnibus government funding legislation,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) wrote in a “Dear Colleague” letter on Sunday night. However, lawmakers haven’t yet unveiled the government funding bill and the House is scheduled to leave town for the week after Wednesday for the House Democrat’s Issues Conference in Philadelphia, giving them just a matter of two days to pass the yet-to-be-introduced legislation. Further complicating matters is the Biden administration’s request for $22.5 billion—less than the $30 billion that had originally been floated—to deal with the coronavirus pandemic. Some 35 Republicans, led by Senator Mitt Romney (R-Utah), had said previously that they needed a full accounting of how the government has spent the more than $5 trillion already approved by Congress in several rounds of aid. Republicans have also pointed to some $105 billion remaining in a coronavirus relief fund at the end of January.
A group of conservatives is also demanding a vote on defunding President Biden’s vaccine mandates in exchange for speeding up any government funding legislation. The group made similar demands on the previous stop-gap bills passed by Congress and were able to get amendment votes, which ultimately failed. The group of 10 Senate conservatives who are led by Republican Steering Committee Chairman Mike Lee (R-Utah) and are threatening to hold up the government-funding measure and possibly trigger a federal shutdown were joined on Friday afternoon by a group of nearly 40 House Republicans who sent a letter to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-California) announcing they will oppose “any federal government funding measure that funds the enforcement of COVID-19 vaccine mandates” even if it means shutting the government down.
For today, the Senate will reconvene at 3:00 P.M. and continue work on H.R.3076, the Postal Service Reform Act with a vote on cloture expected at 5:30 P.M. The Senate is expected to continue working on the legislation to overhaul the United States Postal Service this week, after advancing the legislation after an initial hurdle last week. The bill, which has already passed the House, eliminates a requirement that the Postal Service prepay future retirement health benefits and allows the Postal Service to provide non-postal services as part of an agreement with state and local governments. It also requires that the Postal Service make deliveries at least six days of the week.
The House will reconvene at 2:00 P.M. with first votes at 6:30 P.M. and is expected to take up four bills under suspension of the Rules from the Homeland Security Committee.
Adam S. Olsen, Washington, D.C.
