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The Senate is in session this week. While the House is out for recess, House leaders added three days back to the calendar – February 28 through March 1 – directly before the first part of the recently enacted stopgap Continuing Resolution (CR) expires on March 1. After passing the CR last week, the Senate’s focus turns to completing bipartisan border policy reform as part of a national security supplemental package.
On Friday, President Joe Biden signed the “Further Continuing Appropriations and Other Extensions Act, 2024” (P.L. 118-35) into law, extending government funding at enacted Fiscal Year (FY) 2023 funding levels from Friday, January 19, 2024, to March 1, 2024 for some federal agencies and programs, and to Friday, March 8, 2024 for others. On Thursday, the Senate passed this “laddered” stop-gap CR by a vote of 77-18, followed by the House of Representatives by a vote of 314-108. Appropriators and staff worked over this past weekend on finalizing 302(b) allocations for each of the 12 bills (i.e., total allocation amounts for each appropriations subcommittee), however, no agreement has been reached as of today.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said today that bipartisan border discussions are “largely done” and have “really moved over” to the Senate Appropriations Committee. Murphy said, “There’s no reason why we couldn’t begin consideration this week.” Lead negotiators, including Murphy and Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) and James Lankford (R-Okla.), are still finalizing the text and believe the agreement has the most optimistic chance of passing as both caucuses in the upper chamber have received briefings. Passage of the Biden Administration’s $106 billion national security supplemental request for Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan, and the Indo-Pacific region depends on the inclusion of border and immigration-related policy changes. One of the major remaining sticking points is regarding presidential parole authority, which many believe was resolved in the most recent negotiations. Even if the Senate were to take action on and pass border reform legislation this week, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) would likely not allow the House to consider any such Senate-passed agreement without changes from the House first.
After Rep. Bill Johnson’s (R-Ohio) resignation took effect today, House Republicans now only hold a one-seat majority, at 219 members. Speaker Johnson will have minimal room to maneuver through votes in the lower chamber as the GOP holds the smallest GOP majority in decades. Rep. Johnson leaves the House after serving six terms to become the president of Youngstown State University in mid-March.
For the remainder of the week, the Senate will also hold several hearings, including a Senate Small Business & Entrepreneurship Committee hearing on “Succession Planning: Opportunities to Build Wealth and Keep Jobs in Local Communities;” and a Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee hearing on “Reauthorization of the National Flood Insurance Program: Local Perspectives on Challenges and Solutions.”
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