Friday, September 20

Congress prevents government shutdown: approved budget until February


El Capitolio en Washington DC. es la sede del Congreso.
The Capitol in Washington DC. It is the headquarters of the Congress.

Photo: MANDEL NGAN / AFP / Getty Images

Maria Ortiz

By: Maria Ortiz

The legislators of the House of Representatives and the Senate approved on Thursday a budget bill for the federal government until early next year , narrowly avoiding a shutdown, after some Republicans tried to take advantage of the impending fiscal deadline to fight COVID vaccine mandates – 19 of President Biden, according to The Washington Post.

The two successful votes on Thursday marked the end of a short but tense period, which would have halted operations of federal agencies on Saturday morning , an event that Democrats had described as irresponsible and dangerous in the middle of a pandemic of cor Deadly onavirus .

The new agreement, which goes to the signature of the president Joe Biden , covers federal spending up to 18 February 2022.

By that date, legislators must take another step to pass a short-term federal budget or complete work on a dozen stalled appropriations bills , funding the country’s government for the remainder of the fiscal year 2022, which ends in September.

Even when Republican lawmakers insisted they didn’t want to push the country over a fiscal cliff, they still came dangerously close to missing their deadline.

To resolve the stagnation nt, the parties agreed to vote on the interim budget bill, as well as a Republican amendment to prohibit the use of federal funds for COVID vaccine mandates – 19, which ultimately failed.

Early Thursday, the House passed a continuing resolution to fund the government through 18 February. The final vote was 221 – 212. Representative Adam Kinzinger of Illinois was the only Republican to join Democrats in voting for the resolution.

The final vote in the Senate was end of 69 – 28.

For many lawmakers, the entire saga only served to highlight the extent of political acrimony on Capitol Hill, where even the most basic responsibilities of government quickly turn into partisan clashes.

Because when the government runs out of funds, most government agencies, museums and national parks close their doors, while hundreds of thousands of federal employees are left temporarily without work and without pay.

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