On the edge of a government shutdown, a divided US House of Representatives late on Thursday voted to keep the government open past deadline yesterday — setting up an eleventh-hour standoff in the US Senate, where Democrats have vowed to kill the measure.
The partisan roadblock in the Republican-controlled Senate left just a day and little hope for negotiators searching for a way to avoid shuttering federal offices and keeping thousands of employees home from work.
A closure, coming on the one-year anniversary of US President Donald Trump’s inauguration, would be only the fourth such episode in about two decades and pose perils for both parties in an election year.
Still, Senate Democrats appeared ready to take the risk of shouldering the blame. Emboldened by a liberal base clamoring to challenge Trump, they have demanded concessions on immigration, chiefly protection for thousands of young immigrants facing deportation, and largely unified behind the effort.
Leaders on Thursday said they would have the votes to block the House-passed measure that would have funded the government for another four weeks.
Republican leaders said the plan would give the White House and lawmakers more time to work through the disputes on immigration and spending that they have tangled over for months.
With trust at a low ebb, Democrats said they were not willing to give Republicans that time to negotiate, arguing that they could be back in the same standoff a month from now and push for a shorter extension that could keep the pressure on.
Most Senate Democrats and some Republicans were expected to vote against the House plan.
Senate rejection would leave the pathway ahead uncertain with only one guarantee: finger-pointing by both parties, which began as that chamber debated the measure late on Thursday.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell accused Democrats of a “fixation on illegal immigration,” which he said “has them threatening to filibuster spending for the whole government.”
The stakes are high for Republicans, who control the US Congress and the White House and are still struggling to prove they can govern.
Republicans control the Senate 51-49, but would need substantial Democratic backing to reach 60 — the number needed to end Democratic delaying tactics.
Republicans were all but daring Democrats to scuttle the bill and force a shutdown because of immigration, which they said would hurt Democratic senators seeking re-election in 10 states that Trump carried in 2016.
Republicans in the House faced their own divisions on the short-term bill, ones only overcome after a last-minute round of bargaining with conservatives.
The House voted by a near party-line 230-197 vote to approve the legislation. Just 11 Republicans, mostly conservatives and a pair of moderate Hispanic lawmakers, opposed the measure.
Six Democrats, a mix of Hispanic and moderate legislators, backed the bill.
Shadowing everything is this November’s elections.
Trump’s historically poor popularity and a string of Democratic election victories have fueled that party’s hopes of capturing control of the House and perhaps the Senate.
Congress needed to act by midnight yesterday, or the government would begin immediately locking its doors.
In the event of a shutdown, food inspections and other vital services would continue, as would social security, other federal benefit programs and most military operations.
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