House Defeats New CR as Shutdown Looms

The shutdown saga continued today as Republican House leadership brought a pared down Continuing Resolution to the floor for a vote knowing it probably would fail, and it did, with both Republican and Democratic opposition.  Just over 24 hours before the current CR expires, the path forward is unclear.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and his team met with Vice President-elect Senator JD Vance (R-OH) and others today to craft a new CR after Elon Musk, President-elect Donald Trump, and Vance tanked a bipartisan bill developed over many weeks by Johnson and House and Senate leaders yesterday.

A new bill, H.R. 10515, emerged late this afternoon and was endorsed by Trump. Just 117 pages long, it shed most of the 1,157 pages in the original bill largely by eliminating Democratic priorities. It also responded to Trump’s surprise demand to use the CR to suspend the debt limit while President Biden is still in office so his Administration won’t have to do it after he takes office on January 20.  H.R. 10515 would have suspended the debt limit until 2027.

Suspending the debt limit without corresponding spending cuts is anathema to many Republicans, however, including the most conservative Republicans, who came out in strong opposition to the measure. They control the House Rules Committee, which ordinarily must approve bills before they go to the House floor for a vote. One committee member, Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX), left no doubt about how he would vote.

“My position is simple — I am not going to raise or suspend the debt ceiling (racking up more debt) without significant & real spending cuts attached to it.” pic.twitter.com/WuPoTVlrtL

— Rep. Chip Roy Press Office (@RepChipRoy) December 19, 2024

Recognizing H.R. 10515 wouldn’t be approved by Rules, Johnson brought the bill to the floor on the suspension calendar. That circumvents the Rules Committee, but requires a two-thirds vote to pass instead of a simple majority and is typically used for non-controversial legislation that can easily muster that much bipartisan support.

With 219 Republicans and 211 Democrats currently in the House, Johnson needed a significant number of Democrats in addition to his own Republicans to vote yes.  House Democratic Leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) blasted the bill, however, calling it “laughable,” and insisting the bipartisan agreement the House was supposed to vote on yesterday is what Democrats support.

.@RepJeffries: “The Musk-Johnson proposal is not serious. It’s laughable. Extreme MAGA Republicans are driving us to a government shutdown.” pic.twitter.com/PoHVNeInsv

— CSPAN (@cspan) December 19, 2024

In the end, the bill went down to defeat 174-235, with 172 Republicans and 2 Democrats in favor, and 38 Republicans and 197 Democrats opposed. One Democrat voted present and 9 Republicans and 11 Democrats did not vote. With 409 members voting, 273 would have had to vote yes to reach the two-thirds threshold.

Johnson called the result “disappointing” and blamed Democrats, asserting that all that changed was adding the debt limit provision.

.@SpeakerJohnson after failed CR vote: “It’s very disappointing to us that all but two Democrats voted against…all these bipartisan measures that had already been negotiated and decided upon…” pic.twitter.com/WkNs1JZfbx

— CSPAN (@cspan) December 20, 2024

What happens next is unclear.  The House is scheduled to meet tomorrow at 9:00 am ET. The House Majority Leader’s schedule says only that “Legislation related to government funding is possible.”

It is still conceivable to avoid a shutdown.  A simple bill extending the deadline for a week or two while the parties negotiate a solution is all that’s needed, but there’s no indication that’s being considered.

H.R. 10515 did retain language in the previous bill, which was never assigned a number, that would have provided funding to NASA and the U.S. Space Force to repair facilities damaged by hurricanes and other natural disasters. NASA would have received $740 million. The Space Force would have gotten $90 million in Operations and Maintenance, plus $37.9 million in procurement.