Moments ago the Senat passed the debt ceiling/government funding/hurricane aid deal, cobbled between Trump and the Democrats to howls of protest from the GOP, in an 80-17 vote.
As a result, the debt limit will be suspended until December 8 and and fund govt through Dec. 8; it also provides $15.25b in disaster funding for hurricane assistance. A vote in the House is expected tomorrow, where the bill will also pass: it will be interesting which Republicans vote against the Trump/Democratic proposal.
As discussed yesterday and this morning, the deal has faced widespread opposition in the GOP, particularly among conservatives. Though Republicans support helping communities devastated by Hurricane Harvey, many are loath to raise the debt ceiling or fund the government without spending or entitlement reforms. The Republican Study Committee (RSC), the largest GOP caucus in the House with more than 150 members, and this morning. The RSC’s opposition means the deal might pass the House mainly with Democratic votes — an unusual dynamic with a Republican in the White House.
Meanwhile in the Senate, while few Republican senators were happy with the deal, they thought Trump was within his rights to make it. “I think Senator McConnell said it’s the president’s prerogative to cut a deal if he wants to. And he apparently thought that was advantageous,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), the No. 2 Senate Republican. But Cornyn added he would have preferred to have a longer extension noting that “lifting the debt ceiling is always unpleasant and usually we like to have some offsets or reforms.”
The surprise agreement left GOP leadership with a tough sale to rank-and-file members and an unenviable December schedule, when they’ll need to wrangle together another agreement to avoid a shutdown and raise the debt ceiling for the second time in three months.
