Congressional leaders in both chambers have agreed to a deal on 2024 spending that would avert a government shutdown.
The deal, which must pass Congress, allots $886 billion to the Department of Defense’s annual budget. Non-defense spending for the fiscal year comes in at $773 billion – in what critics are calling a victory for Democrats.
Both figures are in line with the totals agreed to by President Biden and then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy as part of last summer’s debt-ceiling package.
The Daily Caller reports that anger from Speaker Mike Johnson’s right-flank is palpable and could be enough to derail the effort to avoid a government shutdown:
Legislators now have 12 days to conduct further negotiations and lock in the final bill text, as available cash for numerous federal agencies will run out on Jan. 19, according to Politico. The funding for the military and several of the largest government programs will expire on Feb. 2, while Sunday’s breakthrough may reduce the chances of an eventual shutdown, a host of contentious issues, including potential reforms to address the crisis unfolding at the southern border, remain unresolved.
Beyond the border, questions still remain about the form that military aid packages to Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan could take, according to Politico.
The Republican majority in the House is slim, which will fall to just one vote after Jan. 21, so Johnson can ill afford many defections from his caucus; Republican Rep. Chip Roy of Texas has already voiced his concerns, writing in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that the proposed “topline in spending is terrible” and that “as usual, we keep spending more money we don’t have.” The deal reflects spending levels that are still significantly higher than what fiscal hawks in the Republican caucus have stated they would like to see.
In a Sunday letter to lawmakers, Johnson touted $16 billion in new spending reductions that he was able to win beyond what McCarthy was able to achieve during the debt ceiling fight, slicing $30 billion from funding bills drafted previously in the Senate, according to Politico. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, meanwhile, wrote on X that he is “encouraged that the Speaker and Democratic Leaders have identified a path toward completing FY 2024 appropriations” because “America faces serious national security challenges, and Congress must act quickly to deliver the full-year resources this moment requires.”
Some fiscal hawks in the GOP caucus are not convinced. Others expressed dissatisfaction that they only learned about the deal via social media. One representative who spoke with the Washington Examiner complained that the eight Republicans who removed McCarthy from the speaker’s office failed to find a more fiscally conservative alternative.
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