The Senate passed funding to keep the US operating until mid-March just after a midnight deadline, sending the bill to President Joe Biden for his signature.
The 85 to 11 vote early Saturday morning came more than six hours after the measure sailed through the House, capping off a tumultuous two days in which two earlier plans pursued by Speaker Mike Johnson collapsed under pressure from President-elect Donald Trump and key adviser Elon Musk.
Biden will sign the bill, which extends government funding to March 14 and includes more than $100 billion in aid for natural disaster victims and farmers, the White House said in a statement. The Senate vote backing the legislation was likely the last of the 118th Congress.
As the US government teetered on the brink of a holiday shutdown, federal agencies moved ahead with preparations on Friday, notifying workers earlier in the day they might be furloughed. While key services such as law enforcement, air traffic control and airport screening would continue during a shutdown, the workers would temporarily go without pay.
The late turmoil over a short-term spending package that had been expected to be relatively free of drama vividly demonstrated both Trump’s power over fellow Republicans and its limits.
Republican lawmakers quickly abandoned a bipartisan deal Johnson had carefully negotiated after Trump and his billionaire ally Musk attacked it in social media posts on Wednesday. But then a new funding package tailored to meet Trump’s demand that the national debt limit be waived or raised before the president-elect takes office failed when 38 Republican conservatives refused to go along.
Musk publicly backed the funding package as the House began voting, giving a boost to both the legislation and the embattled speaker. The House will vote for a new speaker on Jan. 3 and restive ultra-conservatives could threaten to unseat him.
“The Speaker did a good job here, given the circumstances,” Musk said on his social media platform X. “It went from a bill that weighed pounds to a bill that weighed ounces.”
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