The week of September 20th marks the first week since the end of July that both the House and Senate were simultaneously in session. Amongst the many priorities and deadlines Congress hopes to meet in the coming weeks, the most immediate concern is currently the passage of a continuing resolution (CR) before Fiscal Year (FY) 2022 begins on October 1st. On September 21st, the House passed a CR by a party-line vote of 220-211. The bill (section-by-section summary is here and full text here) funds the federal government at current levels through December 3, 2021, suspends the statutory debt limit through December 16, 2022, and provides “$28.6 billion to address the rising cost of climate change: recent natural disasters, including Hurricanes Ida, Delta, Zeta, and Laura, wildfires, severe droughts and winter storms, and other natural and major disasters declared in 2021 and prior years.” Notably, the package did not include a stopgap provision to extend surface transportation programs — also known as the FAST Act and “the highway bill”—beyond September 30th when the current surface transportation authorization is due to expire.
The bill now heads to the Senate, where at least ten Republicans would need to join with all Democrats for its passage. However, nearly every Republican senator has expressed opposition to raising the debt limit, arguing instead that Democrats should act on their own through the budget reconciliation process already being used for their $3.5 trillion spending package. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) and Senator Richard Shelby (R-Alabama), Ranking Member on the Senate Appropriations Committee, have filed their own version of a short-term funding bill that includes everything else requested from the White House beyond a debt limit increase. While multiple scenarios are possible, we expect Democrats to eventually opt to remove the debt limit from the stopgap spending bill. That would ensure the bipartisan passage of the funding measure, with Democrats creating a separate reconciliation bill that deals narrowly with lifting the debt limit.