Johnson grasps for funding plan with shutdown looming | CPT PPP Coverage

WASHINGTON — With just a week left to avert a government shutdown, new House Speaker Mike Johnson is facing his first big test as he tries to win House Republican support for a short-term funding plan — a task that looks increasingly difficult amid stubborn divisions in the party over federal spending.

Federal agencies are making plans for a shutdown that would shutter government services and halt paychecks for millions of federal workers and military troops.

It’s a disruption that Johnson — just two weeks into his job running the House — has said he wants to avoid. Yet House lawmakers left Washington for the weekend without a plan in hand after several setbacks. Johnson is still sounding out support among Republicans about what to do and is expected to unveil funding legislation over the weekend, according to Republicans granted anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

The shrinking calendar gives Johnson, a Louisiana Republican who has vaulted from the lower ranks of GOP leadership to the speaker’s office, a narrow window to corral an unpredictable Republican conference.

“We’re running up against the clock on Nov. 17, and we’re obviously aware of that,” Johnson said this week, referring to the date that government funding expires. “But we are going to get the job done.”

Hardline conservatives, usually loath to support temporary spending measures of any sort, had indicated they would give Johnson some leeway to pass legislation, known as a continuing resolution, to give Congress more time to negotiate a long-term agreement. Congress passed a 47-day continuing resolution in October, but the fallout was severe. Kevin McCarthy was booted from the speakership days later, and the House was effectively paralyzed for most of the month while Republicans tried to elect a replacement.

Republicans eventually were unanimous in electing Johnson speaker, but his elevation has hardly eased the dynamic that led to McCarthy’s removal — a conference torn on policy as well as how much to spend on federal programs. This week, Republicans had to pull two spending bills from the floor — one to fund transportation and housing programs and the other to fund the Treasury Department, Small Business Administration and other agencies — because they didn’t have the votes in their own party to push them through the House.

“I thought we were going to show the speaker a little bit of grace,” a frustrated Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, said as he exited the Capitol on Thursday after the last votes of the week. “I think it’s looking like we’re still confused and we are not united.”

Johnson has turned to House Republicans for ideas on how to win support for a continuing resolution. He has floated the obscure idea of a “laddered” approach that would fund some parts of the government until early December and other federal departments until mid-January. He has also raised the idea of a funding package that would last into January.

Meanwhile, lawmakers are still looking for a way to negotiate final passage of aid for Israel in its war with Hamas.