With hours to go before a government shutdown is poised to go into effect, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy announced Saturday he would try to push a short-term funding bill through the House with Democratic help — a move that could keep government open but puts his speakership at risk.
"The House is going to act so government will not shut down," McCarthy said, after an early-morning meeting with the Republican conference Saturday. "We will put a clean funding, stopgap on the floor to keep government open for 45 days for the House and Senate to get their work done."
He told reporters that it would give lawmakers more time to finish work on individual appropriations bills. The measure does not contain funding for Ukraine that was sought by Democrats but opposed by many Republicans. It does, however, include spending for disaster relief.
"Knowing what transpired through the summer — the disasters in Florida, the horrendous fire in Hawaii and also disasters in California and Vermont — we will put the supplemental portion that the president asks for in disaster there, too," McCarthy said.
The House was preparing for a quick vote Saturday on the plan.
"Our options are slipping away every minute," said one senior Republican, Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart of Florida, as he left the private session at the Capitol.
But House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, of New York, said Democrats need more time to review the bill.
"We need time on behalf of the American people that we represent, to evaluate the continuing resolution that will be before the House of Representatives," he told reporters at the Capitol as the Democratic Caucus was gathering to meet. "Why are you rushing it at the 11th hour, when in fact, just yesterday, extreme MAGA Republicans voted on a bill that would slash spending by 30%?"
With no deal in place before Sunday, federal workers will face furloughs, more than 2 million active-duty and reserve military troops will work without pay and programs and services that Americans rely on from coast to coast will begin to face shutdown disruptions.
The sudden House action would fund government at current 2023 levels for 45 days and provide money for U.S. disaster relief.
McCarthy, Republican of California, will be forced to rely on Democrats for passage because the speaker's hard-right flank has said it will oppose any short-term measure. McCarthy was setting up a process for voting that will require a two-thirds supermajority, about 290 votes in the 435-member House for passage. Republicans hold a 221-212 majority, with two vacancies.
Relying on Democratic votes and leaving his right-flank behind is something that the hard-right lawmakers have warned will risk McCarthy's job as speaker. They are almost certain to quickly file a motion to try to remove McCarthy from that office, though it is not at all certain there would be enough votes to topple the speaker.
"If somebody wants to remove because I want to be the adult in the room, go ahead and try," McCarthy said of the threat to oust him. "But I think this country is too important."
The quick pivot comes after the collapse Friday of McCarthy's earlier plan to pass a Republican-only bill with steep spending cuts up to 30% to most government agencies that the White House and Democrats rejected as too extreme.
Across the Capitol, the Senate also prepared a rare Saturday session to advance its own bipartisan package that is supported by Democrats and Republicans and would fund the government for the short-term, through Nov. 17.
"Congress has only one option to avoid a shutdown — bipartisanship," said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York.
Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky echoed the sentiment, warning his own hard-right colleagues there is nothing to gain by shutting down the federal government.
"It heaps unnecessary hardships on the American people, as well as the brave men and women who keep us safe," McConnell said.
The federal government is heading straight into a shutdown that poses grave uncertainty for federal workers in states all across America and the people who depend on them — from troops to border control agents to office workers, scientists and others.
Families that rely on Head Start for children, food benefits and countless other programs large and small are confronting potential interruptions or outright closures. At the airports, Transportation Security Administration officers and air traffic controllers are expected to work without pay, but travelers could face delays in updating their U.S. passports or other travel documents.
An earlier McCarthy plan to keep the government open collapsed Friday due to opposition from a faction of 21 hard-right holdouts despite steep spending cuts of nearly 30% to many agencies and severe border security provisions.
The White House has brushed aside McCarthy's overtures to meet with President Joe Biden after the speaker walked away from the debt deal they brokered earlier this year that set budget levels.
Catering to his hard-right flank, McCarthy had returned to the spending limits the conservatives demanded back in January as part of the deal-making to help him become the House speaker.
After Friday's vote, McCarthy's chief Republican critic, Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida, said the speaker's bill "went down in flames as I've told you all week it would."
Some of the Republican holdouts, including Gaetz, are allies of former President Donald Trump, who is Biden's chief rival in the 2024 race. Trump has been encouraging the Republicans to fight hard for their priorities and even to "shut it down."