Former President Trump had no comment as House and Senate Republicans railed against a $1.2 trillion spending package that funded President Biden’s administration.
While House and Senate conservatives railed against the $1.2 trillion federal funding bill that passed Friday, as the de facto leader of the Republican Party remained silent.
Former President Donald Trump, the GOP’s presumptive 2024 nominee, made no public comments, and his campaign did not respond to multiple requests for comment on the bill, which President Biden signed into law on Saturday.
“This agreement represents a compromise, which means neither side got everything it wanted,” Biden, a Democrat, said in a statement. “But it rejects extreme cuts from House Republicans and expands access to child care, invests in cancer research, funds mental health and substance use care, advances American leadership abroad, and provides resources to secure the border that my administration successfully fought to include. That’s good news for the American people.”
Congress avoided a lengthy partial government shutdown Saturday when the Senate passed the spending package 74-24 in the wee hours of the morning. The bill passed the House on Friday by a vote of 286-134, with a majority of Republicans, 113, voting against it.
Republican opponents seethed as the package moved through Congress, arguing that it did little to address the $34 trillion national debt, funded Biden’s policies that they oppose and failed to include border security enforcement measures that GOP lawmakers had demanded in order to fund the Department of Homeland Security.
The final vote violated the so-called Hastert Rule, a long held GOP “rule,” named after former House Speaker Dennis Hastert, that holds Republican leadership should allow votes only on bills that have a “majority of the majority” in agreement — in other words, only if a majority of Republicans support them.
That outcome reflected deep divisions within the House GOP conference, with many Republicans expressing frustration at leadership for unveiling the 1,012-page package just 48 hours before lawmakers were asked to vote.
