Possible Government Shutdown
From the Ag Information Network, I’m Bob Larson. A government shutdown looms in less than three weeks and lawmakers still can’t agree on how to avert it or the impact on constituents, including farmers and ranchers.
The only agreement by the two parties’ Congressional leaders so far is the need for a Continuing Budget Resolution.
Washington State Senate Democrat Patty Murray hopes three Senate-passed spending bills, including USDA’s, 4-Billion less than the House, can be salvaged …
MURRAY … “As part of a bipartisan short-term CR, I support conferencing those three-bills and passing them with the short-term CR for the remaining nine bills.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune …
THUNE … “My hope would be that whatever that CR looks like, that it’s clean and that it enables us to buy some time to get a regular appropriations process done. But we will, inevitably, it looks like, need a CR for some time in the foreseeable future. And what that looks like and how long that might extend, I think probably is a matter of discussion.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson backs a short-term CR while conferencing USDA and two other bills with the Senate …
JOHNSON … “We have not done the appropriations process the way it is legally supposed to work in a long, long time around here. And we’re trying to force the body back to that. And if we can get to a conference committee, that’s the first, next, important step in returning to that.
So, that’s what we’re advocating.”
Senate Democrats insist Republicans first restore earlier clipped Obamacare subsidies.
