Shutdown deadline looms over Congress' return

[nitpicker]

http://www.defensenews.com/articles/shutdown-deadline-looms-over-congress-return

Shutdown deadline looms over Congress' return

By: Joe Gould, April 23, 2017

WASHINGTON — There’s a lot of optimism in Congress that when it returns from recess on Monday, it can quickly reach a budget deal, averting both a partial shutdown and a long-term stop-gap budget that would vex defense interests. But it’s unclear how the final appropriations package between House and Senate leaders will treat the White House’s request for $18 billion in domestic cuts, and the added $30 billion for defense and $3 billion for border security. Plus, there is potential for a showdown with Democrats who insist the deal contain continued subsidies for lower-income users of the Affordable Care Act and exclude border wall funding.

Voicing confidence in his party’s leverage, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Democratic and Senate leaders of both parties — the “four corners” — are close to a deal and that President Donald Trump will be to blame if they fail.
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Schumer wants to put off immigration to next year and said Democrats would reject funding for Trump's proposed border wall with Mexico.
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To avert a shutdown when the current stopgap spending bill expires April 28, lawmakers have to pass a budget for fiscal 2017 or pass another stopgap bill. Though a stopgap bill that continues 2016 funding levels through the end of the year is a threat, the chairmen of the House and Senate Armed Services committees have vowed to vote against one because it would restrict defense spending. A weeklong continuing resolution is a possibility, either due to procedural hurdles to quickly calling a vote in the House or for tactical reasons. Leadership may want to call the vote just before the House recesses for a week on May 4 in order to pressure "yes" votes.

Military leaders have called on lawmakers to avoid a long-term continuing resolution and pass the supplemental spending request for defense, arguing that sorely needed training, nuclear modernization, acquisition programs and even the lives of troops on a future battlefield are at stake.

The path to a deal, even Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has acknowledged, will need Democratic support. That’s because it would need 60 votes, and Republicans hold 52 seats.
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[nitpicker]

1. More from The Hill

http://thehill.com/policy/defense/329958-week-ahead-pentagon-funding-in-the-balance-as-shutdown-deadline-looms