The House of Representatives voted on Tuesday night to punt the threat of another government shutdown until after the November midterm elections.House lawmakers passed a bill to extend the current fiscal year's funding levels until Dec.4 via a measure called a continuing resolution (CR).
It would extend several weeks into fiscal year (FY) 2027, which begins on Oct.1.It's a victory for Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and House Republicans, who are looking to avoid a messy federal spending fight right before what's expected to be an uphill battle to retain their razor-thin majority.SENATE WEIGHS NEW, PAINFUL LEVERAGE TACTIC AS FEARS OF ANOTHER GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN GROWSpeaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., talks with reporters in the U.S.
Capitol on June 10, 2026.(Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)The current fiscal year saw the longest government shutdown in history, lasting from Oct.
1, 2025 until Nov.12, 2025, as Senate Democrats blockaded GOP-led funding priorities for weeks in protest of spending cuts to federal healthcare programs.And Republicans are warning that Democrats would almost certainly cause another government shutdown right before the election if the fight is not punted until after the early November midterms."Unfortunately, given that Democrats have already forced the two longest government shutdowns in American history in this Congress, one of them for 78 days, they've already demonstrated they don't care what kind of pain they inflict on the American people," Johnson told reporters on Tuesday.
"They've shown there's nothing they'd love more than a government shutdown as tens of millions of Americans head to the polls in November."House Democratic Caucus Chairman Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., told reporters Tuesday that he would vote against the bill along with the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, the panel tasked with overseeing yearly federal spending."I think that there are some drafting errors within the CR that...