The leaders of the US Congress reached an agreement this Saturday to avoid a partial closure of the Administration starting next week. The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, and the Democratic Majority Leader in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, have agreed on a legislative measure that extends the Government's spending capacity until March.
Until now, the Administration had funds to keep part of its organizations fully operational until next February 2. But for the rest, the deadline ran out at midnight next Friday. The new measure, known as “continued resolution”, will allow payments to continue from the Administration bodies until March 1, and the rest, until March 8.
Johnson plans to hold a meeting with his congressmen this Sunday to discuss the details of the pact.
Schumer and the president of the House of Representatives had taken a first step to avoid a partial shutdown of the Administration last weekend, when they announced a pact to establish a spending ceiling in the total of the dozen budget laws that finance the functioning of the State.
That pact set the ceiling at 1.66 trillion dollars, of which 886,000 million were allocated to defense spending. Another 69,000 million would be dedicated to adjustment for inflation, and 704,000 million, to items not related to Defense. But it did not specify how exactly that expense should be distributed, the crux of the dispute between the two parties.
And although the leaders of both Houses had managed to reach an agreement, the hard wing of the Republicans in the House of Representatives had criticized that measure. Some of the legislators that make up it demanded concessions from Democrats to tighten border control in exchange for avoiding paralysis of the Administration.
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Throughout this week, the protests of these legislators seemed to endanger the delicate negotiation: Johnson has a very slim majority in the lower house, and needs almost every one of his votes to move forward with any measure. On Friday, however, he assured that what was agreed was maintained.
The agreement reached between Schumer and Johnson this Saturday extends the deadline by one month for legislators to debate and reach an agreement on the distribution of funds and allocations contained in each of the dozen budget laws.
Democrats and Republicans had approved a second extension last November to avoid the closure of the Administration, similar to the one that had previously cost Johnson's predecessor, Kevin McCarthy, his position in September. At that time it was decided to extend the financing for part of the organizations until this Friday and for the rest, until February 2. Among those departments that saw their operations threatened in a matter of days was the Department of Transportation, whose paralysis threatened to sow chaos in the country's air traffic.
Among the budget items being debated by both parties is the Democratic government's request for a fund of more than $110 billion, which includes more than $64 billion to help Ukraine repel the Russian invasion. Another 14 billion would go to assist Israel in its offensive in Gaza. And 6 billion dollars would be used on the border with Mexico.
To approve these funds, Republicans demand a tightening of border control measures. Delegations from both parties have been negotiating for weeks to try to find common ground, although so far they have not made much progress.
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