House passes temporary spending bill to avoid midnight shutdown, sends to Senate

In an unexpected twist, the House on Saturday passed a stopgap spending bill with just hours until a government shutdown with Democrats providing the necessary votes to pass Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s “clean” bill. 

The bill to extend current levels of government funding for 45 days passed in a 335-91 vote, with all the no votes cast by Mr. McCarthy’s Republicans.

Mr. McCarthy, California Republican, and the rest of House GOP leadership spun the short-term measure’s passage as a Republican victory, but the speaker needed Democratic votes to pass it — more Democrats voted in favor of the measure than Republicans. 

Mr. McCarthy said he brought the clean legislation to the floor after exhausting every option and speaking with every member of the Republican Conference.

“If you have members in your conference that won’t let you vote for appropriations … and won’t vote for a stopgap measure, so the only answer is to shut down and not pay our troops, I don’t want to be a part of that team. I want to be a part of the conservative group that wants to get things done,” the speaker said after the bill passed.

The vote, while putting Congress on track to stop a partial government shutdown, puts Mr. McCarthy in jeopardy of losing the job of speaker. 

Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, who is a leader of the arch-conservatives opposing any stopgap spending and who has been crusading to oust Mr. McCarthy, said the speaker’s hold on the gavel is shaky.

“I would say it’s on some tenuous ground,” Mr. Gaetz told reporters at the Capitol. “Right now, our plan is to continue to build support for our single-subject spending bills. This 45-day [bill] does not liberate us from our nation’s financial challenges. We remain $33 trillion in debt. We’re facing $2.2 trillion annual deficits.”

When Mr. McCarthy unveiled the “clean” bill and dared Democrats to oppose it, he also said he welcomed Mr. Gaetz’s motion to kick him out as speaker.

“If somebody wants to remove [me] because I want to be the adult in the room. Go ahead and try,” Mr. McCarthy said.

The stopgap bill is now headed to the Democratic-run Senate where Sen. Rand Paul, Kentucky Republican, said he will allow it to be fast-tracked to a vote on Saturday. 

Mr. Paul had been blocking a quick vote on the Senate Democrats’ version of a temporary spending bill, delaying the vote until Monday, which would have been after the partial shutdown started.

The Senate version cobbled together by Senate Democratic leader Charles E. Schumer of New York and Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky included $6 billion for Ukraine.

The House bill kept current funding levels, denying Republicans’ demands for deep spending cuts in the extended spending, and included President Biden’s request for $16 billion in emergency disaster funding.

The bill did not include more aid for Ukraine’s war effort, which was a sticking point for Democrats. But faced with a choice of funding the U.S. government or Ukraine, House Democrats unanimously picked the U.S.

During the floor debate, Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro of California criticized the lack of Ukraine money in the bill that her party nevertheless would unanimously support, declaring: “We don’t abandon our allies.”

Mr. McCarthy turned to the clean bill after 21 Republican lawmakers voted down a stopgap bill Friday that included a 30% cut to domestic spending and GOP-backed immigration policy changes and border security measures. 

The holdouts, many of them members of the House Freedom Caucus, vowed to oppose any temporary spending and insisted on passing the 12 annual spending bill that will fund the federal government for fiscal 2024, which begins Sunday.

After the vote, Democratic lawmakers framed Mr. McCarthy’s pivot as a victory for them.

“For 2nd time this year, Democrats have saved Speaker McCarthy’s ass and again show competence beats chaos. Today’s Democratic votes — just like lifting debt ceiling — will keep government open. Absolute embarrassment for MAGA,” Rep. Eric Swalwell, California Democrat, wrote on social media. “We will get Ukraine funding next.”