Congress has agreed to a continuing resolution to fund the Departments of Veterans Affairs, Transportation, Agriculture, Energy and other agencies and will vote today to avert a Saturday March 2nd shutdown of Federal Agencies.
Opinion within Congress varied from the urgent need to pass appropriations bills to favoring a shutdown over narrow issues. The text of appropriations bills must be in the hands of members of Congress 72 hours in advance of a vote hence the need for a continuing resolution.
A significant point of contention has been the funding of the USDA SNAP-WIC program for which $6.3 billion was included in the Senate bill. The minority party in the House had requested $7 billion but the leadership placed a cap of $6 billion on the program. A second obstacle was the requirement that the Veteran’s Administration report the names of patients who require assistance with management of their benefits to a background check system used to screen potential purchasers of weapons.
The Speaker of the House, Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) presided over a contentious conference call on Friday February 23rd while Congress was in recess. If a government shutdown does occur, it is apparent that both parties will be blamed for the inconvenience and damage to the national economy. This prospect will hopefully engender compromise that would normally be expected.
The continuing resolution is essentially kicking the can down the road for the third time after two previous iterations. The final passage of the series of appropriations bills will be based on mutual political expediency and not the wellbeing of the Nation and our citizens. This is no way to run a democracy. We deserve maturity and wisdom in our elected representatives that rises above middle-school intransigence and adherence to narrow and parochial considerations.