House to vote on GOP plan to fund the government with shutdown deadline on the horizon

Washington — The House is set to vote Wednesday on a measure to keep the government funded with less than two weeks before a possible government shutdown. But the measure, paired with what Democrats see as a poison pill on noncitizen voting, faces headwinds in the lower chamber. And even among Republicans, support may fall short. 

House Speaker Mike Johnson announced on Tuesday that the House would move forward with the vote, after delaying it days earlier in the face of opposition from members of his own party. With a razor-thin majority in the House, just a handful of Republicans can tank a partisan bill. And the House GOP's opening salvo in the funding fight has attracted plenty of opponents. 

The continuing resolution would keep the government funded through March 28. But it includes a measure aimed at targeting the practice of illegal voting that Democrats view as a nonstarter. The bill, known as the SAVE Act, would require proof of citizenship to register to vote in federal elections. And despite the fact that only U.S. citizens are eligible to vote in federal elections under current law, the House passed the measure earlier this year. 

The voting legislation, though it's a dead end for Democrats, has been billed as a sweetener for House conservatives, who often oppose stopgap measures to keep the government funded. Whether it's enough to keep the reliably unruly group in line remains to be seen.

The strategy has also picked up opposition from defense hawks, who have raised concern about the impact of a six-month continuing resolution on defense spending. But House Republican leadership has moved ahead with the longer timeline, which could give them more leverage in a funding fight if Donald Trump returns to the White House next year. 

The opposition from multiple sides makes the measure's passage in the House an uphill battle. But Johnson has yet to identify an alternative, despite the Sept. 30 deadline to fund the government.

"We'll see what happens with the bill," Johnson said at a news conference Wednesday morning. "We're on the field in the middle of the game, the quarterback's calling the play. We're going to run the play."

Johnson said it's not House Republicans who "put us in this situation," citing the appropriations work in both chambers so far, while pointing to Senate Democrats who he said have brought "nothing to the table."

"So it is the Senate that has put us in this situation to have to have a CR," Johnson said. "We are the responsible governing party here and we are doing the right thing."

Sen. Susan Collins, a Maine Republican and the top GOP appropriator in the upper chamber, called on Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to bring the full-year funding bills to the floor, criticizing Democratic leadership for wasting time on the issue. 

"It does not have to be this way," Collins said, adding that if Schumer had prioritized bringing the appropriations bills to the floor, the two chambers could have sent the full-year funding bills to to the president's desk before the end of the fiscal year. Congress rarely passes all 12 appropriations bills on time, opting instead for continuing resolutions that extend funding before adopting omnibus packages late in the calendar year.

Senate Republicans have otherwise deferred to the House, with Minority Leader Mitch McConnell telling reporters at a news conference on Tuesday that they "first have to wait and see what the House sends us." But he insisted that there must not be a government shutdown. 

"It would be politically beyond stupid for us to do that right before the election, because certainly we'd get the blame," McConnell said. 

Meanwhile, Senate Democrats have lambasted the speaker for his prolonged opening gambit. Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, the top Democratic appropriator in the Senate, said on Tuesday that it's "time for Speaker Johnson to take a good look in the mirror."

"He is proposing a bill that first off, he can't even get through the House, and second off, he has a flat, zero percent chance of passing here in the Senate," Murray said, arguing that the approach would "leave countless programs, including our military, stuck in limbo for half a year," along with including a "massive poison pill that is the very definition of a nonstarter."

Murray accused Johnson of walking out "onto an extreme partisan limb" with the plan, catering to those on the fringe of his party. She said she had a message for the speaker. 

"There is an off-ramp right in front of you, one you have taken before, one you should know by now actually works — bipartisanship," Murray said. "It's actually pretty simple."