WASHINGTON — The Senate passed a stopgap spending bill early Saturday to fund the federal government through Dec. 11, buying both parties roughly two months before midterm voters go to the polls. The vote was bipartisan, with members from both sides backing the measure to avoid a shutdown at the end of September.
The Dec. 11 deadline is deliberate. It pushes the next funding fight past November's midterm elections, removing a politically costly shutdown threat from the campaign trail. Both parties calculated that a shutdown heading into competitive races carried more risk than a short-term deal.
The House still needs to approve the measure before it reaches the White House. The Senate's early Saturday vote sent the bill to the House, where Speaker Mike Johnson controls the floor schedule. Johnson has not publicly said when a vote would occur.
Stopgap spending bills, known as continuing resolutions, fund the government at existing levels rather than through new appropriations. They do not resolve disagreements over agency budgets, spending cuts or policy riders — they defer them. The Dec. 11 expiration will force Congress to either pass full-year appropriations or approve another stopgap during the lame-duck session after the election.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer both backed the measure, reflecting a shared interest in clearing the deck before November. A shutdown this close to Election Day would have handed each party's opponents a ready-made attack line — though which party would have absorbed more damage was the subject of competing internal calculations on both sides.
Government shutdowns disrupt federal services, delay paychecks for civilian workers, furlough nonessential employees and suspend a range of agency operations. The threat alone draws press coverage that neither party wanted dominating the final weeks of a campaign.
Congress has relied on continuing resolutions more frequently in recent years as the regular appropriations process has stalled. The 12 annual spending bills that fund federal agencies are rarely passed before the Oct. 1 start of the fiscal year. Stopgaps have become the default mechanism for buying time while negotiations continue.
The bill's passage also signals that leadership in both chambers prioritized a clean short-term fix over a fight on riders — individual policy provisions that members often try to attach to must-pass spending bills. Controversial riders on issues like border security, defense spending or social programs can collapse a deal quickly. The bipartisan vote suggests those fights were tabled, at least until December.
With the funding cliff now set for Dec. 11, the post-election lame-duck session becomes the next pressure point. Congress will return after November with either reinforced majorities or new dynamics depending on election results, and leadership on both sides will face immediate pressure to resolve full-year spending for the remainder of fiscal 2026 or pass yet another stopgap into early 2027.
