The end of the longest federal government shutdown in U.S. history could be in sight. Last night, there were enough votes in the U.S. Senate to break the logjam and invoke cloture on a spending bill that would fund the government until January 30th. House Speaker Mike Johnson appeared on KEEL radio in Shreveport this morning to say that the Senate is fast-forwarding the bill today.
“That means instead of the 30 hours for each next stage of debate and all that, they’ll run through it quickly, hopefully, and get it done, maybe as early as today,” Johnson said.
The House has been in recess since the start of the shutdown. Johnson says he has called all House members back, and the House will take up the spending package once everyone is back in Washington.
“I’m going to have all the House members on a 36-hour return notice. That’s how much time it takes to get everybody back, because we have people all the way on the west coast and even overseas. So, they’ll get here and we’ll vote ASAP to get them back opened,” Johnson explained.
Even though Democrats had been adamant that there would be no deal without a guarantee to extend Affordable Care Act subsidies. Democrats, however, got no such guarantees; only a guarantee of a vote on them once the government reopens. Johnson says there are certain things that the spending bill will do once passed.
“It will fully fund the SNAP program all the way through the end of the next fiscal year, which is September 2026. We’re going to make sure all the federal workers get their back pay that they’ve had to endure this terrible time during the shutdown. And we will keep government in operation again,” Johnson said.
It’s unknown if Congress will extend health care subsidies that help Americans pay for health care plans that can be purchased through the Affordable Car Act marketplace.++++
