Punchbowl News: “It’s Dec. 6 and the government runs out of money in 10 days. Senior lawmakers in both parties have been trying to cut an agreement for a yearlong omnibus funding package, yet they remain tens billions of dollars apart – especially on non-defense spending.”
“It seems almost certain that Congress will need to pass a short-term stopgap funding bill sometime ahead of Dec. 16 to give itself more time to try to reach an omnibus deal. So we view the real deadline as sometime between Dec. 23 and the end of the year.”
“This sounds daunting, but the political incentives right now point to Congress being able to figure everything out. House and Senate Democrats want to get one more long-term spending bill into law before the year is up. A lot of Senate Republicans don’t have much faith in a GOP-run House being able to properly pass a government funding bill in the first few months of next year. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy can’t say it out loud – or openly support an omnibus – but he benefits from a long-term funding bill being signed into law now.”
