WASHINGTON — The House of Representatives on Wednesday dropped a proposal by President Donald Trump to require Americans nationwide to show proof of citizenship to register to vote, setting the stage to pass a funding bill aimed at averting a government shutdown next week.
House Republican leaders, facing internal defections, plan to rely heavily on Democratic votes to approve the bill. If it passes, it will go to the Senate, which hopes to quickly approve it Wednesday night, well before the Oct. 1 shutdown deadline. Both chambers are in recess this week and are scheduled for an extended recess until after the Nov. 5 election.
The bill, negotiated by House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, and Democratic leaders, will fund the government at its current budget through Dec. 20, the end of the year. It also provides an additional $231 million for the Secret Service, including for election-related work, in the wake of two assassination attempts on President Trump.
President Trump has openly argued that Republican lawmakers should shut down the government unless he passes his citizenship verification voting bill, known as the SAVE Act, even though it is already illegal and rare for foreign nationals to vote in federal elections.
But after the House of Representatives rejected a combined government funding package and the SAVE Act last week, Johnson withdrew the Trump-backed election bill and sent a mostly clean new spending bill to Congress. Johnson and other key Republicans have defended the move, arguing that a GOP-led government shutdown just 35 days before Election Day amounts to “political malfeasance.”
Johnson denied that he was “running against President Trump” over the voting bill, insisting the two have remained in close contact throughout the funding battle and that they both believe the SAVE Act is crucial to ensuring election integrity.
“I’m not running against President Trump. I’ve had lengthy conversations with him and he’s very unhappy about the situation. His concern is election security and that’s my concern too. It’s a concern for all of us,” Johnson told reporters on Tuesday.
Johnson criticized Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) for not taking up the SAVE Act as a standalone bill in the Senate. “We passed the SAVE Act over the summer, and now it’s sitting on Chuck Schumer’s desk gathering dust, and it pisses us off,” Johnson said. “President Trump understands the dilemma we’re in right now, and there’s no divide between us.”
If the stopgap bill passes, it would mean another battle over a government shutdown during the lame-duck session after the election, but it would give both parties an advantage in knowing the balance of power next year.
“I think the vast majority of Congress doesn’t want a government shutdown,” said Sen. John Boozman, R-Arkansas. “So let’s get through the election and decide what we want to do.”
The short-term funding bill, known as a continuing resolution (CR), was sent to the House through an expedited procedure known as a “suspension of the rules,” which would require a two-thirds majority to pass — something that won’t be needed because conservative members of the Rules Committee, allied with Johnson, refused to allow the bill to move forward in committee.
“It’s just postponing the problem,” lamented Rep. Dan Bishop (R-N.Y.), a member of the far-right Freedom Caucus who plans to vote against the bill.
Instead of blaming Johnson, former Freedom Caucus Chairman Scott Perry (R-Pa.) blamed Senate Democrats for failing to pass any of the 12 government funding bills for the new fiscal year.
“You always blame us, but the Senate hasn’t submitted a budget at all. Zero,” Perry said. “You’re supposed to have a dance partner, and our partner isn’t showing up.”
Schumer said that while it was a waste of time, he was pleased that House Republicans had learned that “partisan scare tactics” don’t work on funding.
“As both parties work to avert a shutdown, we urge House Republican leadership to send this bill to the floor and pass it swiftly. Time is of the essence,” he said Tuesday. “Once the House acts, the Senate will move quickly to enact the CR. I urge my colleagues in both parties to make swift passage of the CR a priority. If we work together and avoid poison pills and partisan fighting, we can avert a government shutdown.”
