After weeks of negotiations, key lawmakers announced on Tuesday that they had reached a deal that would keep the government running until the end of the year.
According to Patrick Leahy, the outgoing Senate Appropriations Committee chairman, appropriators have agreed on a bicameral framework that will allow them to finish a massive budget bill and be signed into law by the president.
Richard Shelby, the ranking member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and Rosa DeLauro, the head of the House Appropriations Committee, are leading the talks to fund the government through the rest of the year.
According to Shelby, the three negotiators were able to start the difficult process of reaching a final agreement on a dozen separate bills.
BREAKING NEWS: @SenShelby says he @SenatorLeahy, and @rosadelauro have an agreement in principle on an Omnibus framework "that allows us to begin the difficult work of reaching agreement across twelve separate bills."
Shelby says deal can get done by the 23rd.
— Josh Rultenberg (@JoshRultNews) December 14, 2022
The deal is expected to be signed by December 23. As for DeLauro, she noted that the framework would allow Congress to pass an "omnibus" before it goes on a Christmas break.
If Congress does not pass an "omnibus" bill before the end of the year, the government will be forced to shut down. To give Congress more time to pass the legislation, a short-term continuing resolution will be passed.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said on Tuesday that the negotiations on a spending bill were close to reaching a deal. However, he urged the negotiators to finish their work by December 22.
Only a few members of Congress are calling for the passage of a year-long spending bill that will fund the government until September 30, 2023.
Some Republican members of the House are also calling for the passage of a short-term spending bill that will fund the government until January.
According to CNN, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California said that he would not support a full-year spending bill.
According to Bloomberg, the Senate and the House had published 7,509 proposed spending bills that included over $16 billion in pet projects known as "earmarks."
The full-year budget of the government is expected to be around $1.7 trillion. According to a report by the website Politico, the defense budget is also expected to be around $858 billion.
The preceding is a summary of an article that originally appeared on Breitbart.
