Senate scraps plan to force second stopgap vote ahead of shutdown
The Senate dropped a plan to make a technical change to a stopgap spending bill that was threatening to send the legislation back to the House with hours left until a shutdown deadline.
Senate Republicans had indicated earlier Wednesday that they were going to change the shell used by the House for the continuing resolution (CR) — a move that would have attached the language of the spending measure to a different bill and sent it back to the House for a second vote.
However, as part of a vote schedule announced when Republicans wrapped up the chamber for the day, the Senate will vote on the continuing resolution as it passed the House instead of trying to attach it to a different bill.
That will allow it to go to the desk of President Trump, who is expected to sign it, and avoid a second vote in the House that would eat up hours before the shutdown deadline.
The Senate is expected to hold three votes related to the CR starting at 11:30 a.m.: a vote related to an amendment from Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), a vote to end debate on the spending legislation and then final passage of the CR.
The government is currently funded through Thursday. That will give Trump less than 12 hours to sign the bill and avoid the second shutdown of the year.
The kerfuffle over how the Senate would pass the CR and if the House would need to vote again started on Tuesday.
The House had been expected to include the CR as part of a commemorative coin bill. Instead, due to an objection by Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), they passed the legislation on Tuesday using a fiscal 2020 bill.
That sparked concern among Senate Republicans that the legislation to which the CR was attached in the House would prevent the Senate from formally going to conference later this year on a package of fiscal 2020 bills.
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