US House likely to vote on stopgap govt funding bill next week

Washington, Sep 15 (IANS) The Democrat-led US House of Representative was likely to vote on a stopgap funding bill next week to avoid a potential government shutdown when the new fiscal year begins on October 1, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said.

“I want to put it on the floor next week,” Xinhua news agency Hoyer as saying in an interview on Monday.

“I want to give the Senate at least a week to pass it. I want to make sure government doesn’t shut down.”

That would give Congressional leaders and the White House just a few days to wrap up negotiations on details of the so-called continuing resolution (CR), which is needed to avert a partial government shutdown starting October 1, according to the CQ Roll Call publishing company.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told reporters on Monday that the White House and Congressional lawmakers were trying to work out a stopgap measure this week.

“We have an agreement that it will be a clean CR. Having said that, the details of the clean CR have to be worked out. And I hope we can finish that this week,” Mnuchin said.

However, Congressional lawmakers and President Donald Trump’s administration remain deadlocked over the next Covid-19 relief package, which is crucial for a sustainable US economic recovery.

“One major disagreement between us is that the administration and the Republicans in Congress are disrespectful of the role that state and local government plays in fighting the virus, as well as in educating our children and meeting the needs of the American people,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on Monday in an interview with MSNBC.

“We all want to have an agreement, but it has to be real. What the Senate did was not real.

“The fact is, though, one of the focuses that we must have if we’re going to come out of this is to attack the virus,” she added.

Last week, the Senate failed to advance a scaled-down Republican Covid-19 relief proposal, which contained roughly $650 billion in total spending.

House Democrats had unveiled a $3 trillion relief proposal in May, which didn’t gain support from the Republicans.

Senate Republicans released their $1 trillion proposal in late July, but lawmakers failed to bridge their differences before the August recess.

–IANS

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