Senate passes on House proposed stopgap bill for government funding
UPDATE--President Biden has signed the stopgap bill into law, according to CNN.
Around 9:00 p.m., Saturday, September 30, just three hours before the government shutdown, the U.S. Senate completed their vote.
On Saturday morning, September 30, the House of Representatives proposed a bipartisan stopgap bill to fund the country until November 17, but it doesn't include additional funding for Ukraine.
Now, it's up to the Senate to vote on the bill by midnight today--giving Congress 45 more days to come up with a more permanent solution.
At around 8:00 p.m., the U.S. senate began voting on HR 5860 on their agreement or disagreement with the House's proposal, with 60 votes required for passing.
Mitch McConnell led the discussion with an opening statement saying,
"The clearest path forward is to pass a straightforward short term funding extension. It's time to continue a number of discussions about outstanding priorities from securing supplemental relief for victims of natural disasters to restoring security and sanity at the southern border, the divided administration is dragged into chaos."
The vote was 88 to 9 in agreement of the bill with certain U.S. senators voting against the bill including:
- Marsha Blackburn, Tennessee
- Mike Braun, Indiana
- Rand Paul, Kentucky
- Roger Marshall, Kansas
- Eric Schmitt, Missouri
- Ted Cruz, Texas
- J.D Vance, Ohio
- Mike Lee, Utah
- Bill Hagerty, Tennessee
The stopgap bill includes government funding for natural disaster aid, but does not include additional funding for Ukraine or border security, according to CNN.
The next step is for President Biden to sign the bill into law.