On Thursday, the Senate approved a previously-passed House bill that extends government funding at last fiscal year’s levels until December 20, 2019. The measure was immediately signed into law by President Trump to avoid a federal government shutdown.
The bill passed on a mostly party-line basis, with some Republicans objecting that Congress has not enacted full-year defense funding bill at higher levels. There had been talk that the bill might include a continuation of some expired funding for minority-serving institutions, but that was not included in what was a fairly “clean” continuing resolution that included just a handful of specific changes to current law. What happens in the next four weeks is less certain. Congressional appropriators had hoped to announce agreement in the last week on totals for each of the 12 appropriations bills (allocations known as the “302(b)” levels), but an agreement has been stymied over how much funding, if any, to include in the Homeland Security bill for a border wall.