With a final vote count of 335-91, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 5860 on Saturday afternoon, a Continuing Resolution, which if enacted prior to midnight September 30, 2023, would avert a federal government shutdown.
The legislation now goes to the Senate for further action, and if adopted, will go to the White House for the President’s final action.
“The CR presented by Speaker Kevin McCarthy was a compromise, as it maintained funding levels for 45 days. While some Democrats expressed their disappointment in not having funding for Ukraine in today’s measure, it was articulated throughout the morning that the priority needs to be the U.S. federal government prior to foreign governments,” said Guam Del. James Moylan.
“If enacted, the federal funding provided to Guam, including compensation for our servicemembers, will remain intact. Those federal services that would have been either delayed or postponed due to employees or programs being deemed as non-essential, would remain status quo."
Moylan said the CR includes the replenishment of the disaster relief fund.
"The CR would keep the government in place at 2023 funding levels prorated over the next 45 days," he added.
Rep. Ed Case of Hawaii said the stopgap measure added $16 billion to the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Disaster Relief Fund.
“The deep division and polarization on Capitol Hill should never have been allowed to take Congress to the brink of still another damaging federal government shutdown," Case said.
"The measure we passed today, while temporary and incomplete, shows that we can if we want to work for practical bipartisan compromise solutions to get things done," he added.
“And it is especially good news that the measure adds fully $16 billion to FEMA’s rapidly depleting Disaster Relief Fund which is providing most of our Maui wildfire emergency disaster assistance," Case said.
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