<\/p>\n
Sen. Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., left, speaks as Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., listens during a news conference after a policy luncheon on Capitol Hill, Wednesday, July 29, 2026, in Washington.<\/p>\n
Mariam Zuhaib\/AP Photo\/Mariam Zuhaib<\/p>\n
Birds fly near the U.S. Capitol, Tuesday, July 28, 2026, in Washington.<\/p>\n
Allison Robbert\/AP Photo\/Allison Robbert<\/p>\n
WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 The Senate in an overnight vote Saturday approved a short-term measure to fund federal agencies into early December and avoid a potentially chaotic government shutdown during the middle of campaign season.<\/p>\n
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The late-summer action on a funding fix is unusual. Normally, Congress waits until the final days or hours of a funding deadline to pass short-term patches, but this time senators acted nearly two months before the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30.<\/p>\n
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The 90-6 vote showed lawmakers are still smarting from the two historic shutdowns that occurred this past year and want to avoid another before voters go to the polls.<\/p>\n
Senate Majority Leader John Thune wanted the funding dealt with before senators went home for the next five weeks to focus on their reelection campaigns and other matters. It got caught up with other issues that pushed votes into the night, but the bill had broad bipartisan support. The House will also have to approve the measure when members return from their August recess before it can go to President Donald Trump’s desk for his signature.<\/p>\n
The bill generally funds the federal government at current levels though Dec. 11, but includes a variety of exceptions that senators negotiated with the White House.<\/p>\n
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Democrats secured language to ensure no money could be transferred to the Border Patrol. They also rejected the White House’s request of $1 billion for early work on a new \u201cTrump-class\u201d battleship that the administration announced on Dec. 22.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe only person who wants these golden ships is Donald Trump so he can slap his name on them,\u201d Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said.<\/p>\n
Hemp provision became a point of contention<\/p>\n
The bill also includes language delaying a national ban on most intoxicating hemp products. That one-month delay prompted outrage from some Senate Republicans who say that too many such products are falling into the hands of often unsuspecting children. The packaging of the products often relies on bright colors and intentionally mimics popular snack brands to attract consumers.<\/p>\n
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Sen. Ted Budd, R-N.C., said that since 2017 there has been nearly a 10-fold increase in cannabis-related emergency room visits by minors in his home state.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a public health crisis that deserves this Senate\u2019s immediate attention,\u201d Budd said. \u201cOur children should never be the testing ground for an industry willing to exploit a loophole in federal law for profit.\u201d<\/p>\n
But the hemp industry said the delay buys time for Congress to craft legislation that protects hemp farmers and businesses while also putting in place safeguards to protect children.<\/p>\n
Trump himself has called Budd to discuss the issue, though the president did not specifically ask the senator to drop his effort, Budd\u2019s spokesman said.<\/p>\n
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\u201cSenator Budd had a friendly phone call with President Trump discussing the legislative efforts regarding THC,\u201d said spokesman Christian McMullen. He said the senator outlined his concerns about \u201cany delay to closing the hemp loophole.\u201d<\/p>\n
Budd tried to strip the hemp delay from the bill, but the Senate turned aside his effort.<\/p>\n
The bill delays a Trump administration rule on grants<\/p>\n
Democratic lawmakers, along with Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, also got language in the bill that would block, for the duration of the funding patch, new regulations on federal grants. The regulations would require a senior political appointee to review grants before they are awarded to ensure, among other things, that they advance the president’s policy priorities. Democrats worry it’s an effort to kill grants destined for Democratic-leaning states.<\/p>\n
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\u201cThey are not interested in making our tax dollars work better \u2014 they just want them to work for Donald Trump,\u201d said Sen. Patty Murray, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee.<\/p>\n
The White House Office of Management and Budget says its effort is about improving accountability to ensure taxpayer dollars aren\u2019t wasted or misused. The issue is sure to be a topic of future negotiations on a full-year spending measure.<\/p>\n
But Collins said the vast majority of the nearly 500,000 people and groups weighing in on the rule are opposed to it.<\/p>\n
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\u201cI don’t think in my time that I’ve been privileged to serve in the Senate that I have ever seen a proposed rule generate that many negative comments,” Collins said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sen. Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., left, speaks as Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., listens during a news conference…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":988716,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5133],"tags":[5229,8120,396491,69,396490,8121,184754,184755,27130,184750,184752,327109,325469,324520,7202,7203,16537,396492,358,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":["post-988715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-america","tag-charles-schumer","tag-christian-mcmullen","tag-donald-trump","tag-government-funding-shutdown-cr","tag-john-thune","tag-package-100024-ap-online","tag-package-100373-mc-complete-state-national","tag-patty-murray","tag-product-30598-ap-national-news-report-a-wire","tag-product-31998-ap-online-national-news","tag-product-32510-ap-online-general-election-news","tag-product-32520-ap-online-other-u-s-government-news","tag-product-46986-ap-online-top-stories","tag-san-antonio","tag-sanantonio","tag-susan-collins","tag-ted-budd","tag-texas","tag-tx","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/988715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=988715"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/988715\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/988716"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=988715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=988715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=988715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}