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The White House on Thursday urged Congress to pass a short-term federal budget bill for avoid a government shutdown and to be able to fund key programs as lawmakers approach a September 30 deadline.
For the second time this year, the United States finds itself in a crisis: unless Congress acts, the government will run out of money on September 30, which it will trigger a shutdown that jeopardizes countless federal programs on which millions of Americans depend.
Currently, the government is funded until the end of September, and the Office of Management and Budget acknowledges that Congress needs more time to reach a “bipartisan and bicameral” agreement on the individual annual appropriations bills for government programs and agencies for fiscal year 2024.
“While crucial work continues to reach a bipartisan and bicameral agreement on the FY 2024 appropriations bills, it is clear that a rolling resolution (CR) will be needed at short notice next month,” a spokesperson for the OMB to The Hill, adding that the OMB would provide Congress with technical assistance to prevent “serious disruptions in government services in the first quarter of the fiscal year.”
The funding deadline looms as House Speaker Kevin McCarthy faces mounting pressure from more conservative members of his party to press ahead with an impeachment inquiry against President Biden.
Last month, McCarthy said House Republicans’ investigations into Biden are “reaching the level of an impeachment inquiry.”
New funding requests that are urgent
The Washington Post first reported that new funding requests made by the Biden administration include an additional $1.4 billion to fund nutrition assistance programs for low-income families, as well as $1.9 billion for the Office of Resettlement Refugees take care of thousands of new arrivals from Haiti and Cuba.
The administration is also asking Congress to allow federal agencies to spend more quickly to prepare for pandemics, process student loan applications and payments, and review Social Security applications.
Thursday’s request adds to a supplemental spending request of approximately $40 billion that the White House sent to Congress earlier this monthwhich included $24 billion in military, financial and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine.
The previous funding request also included a request for $12 billion in supplemental funding, to ensure that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has enough money to respond to natural disasters, as well as to handle future disasters. That figure has become even more pressing as the agency responds to the wildfires in Hawaii and Hurricane Idalia in Florida.
Democrats and Republicans in Congress have tried to push through a series of appropriations bills that would fund the government through fiscal year 2024, which begins Oct. 1.
But the two parties remain sharply opposed on specifics, and House Republicans are seeking spending cuts so deep that Biden and his Democratic allies refuse to go along with them.
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