Congress, Pres. Biden Narrowly Overcomes Shutdown Possibility

Last week, President Biden and the U.S. Congress barely prevented a government shutdown following a long period of disagreements and an inability to compromise on spending laws.

The spending law disagreements came after the national debt surged to a new all-time high, triggering a new resolution to deal with the debt. While many Republicans led by Speaker Mike Johnson proposed spending cuts, Democrats refused, wanting to keep their lofty federal programs.

In the end, President Biden conceded to his congressional colleagues last week after signing the bipartisan spending bill into law, completely averting a near government shutdown during Christmas.

In order for the bill to be passed, it had to not raise spending to appease Republicans, while ending a clause which Trump would've used to increase his borrowing power after the 2026 elections, appeasing Democrats. In the end, it was neither a Democrat nor Republican-favoring bill, as its sole purpose was to prevent a shutdown, no more. Even Elon Musk was skeptical of the political bias of the bill as seen by his comments on X this week.

While this bill was a defeat for Donald Trump in that it didn't lead to spending cuts, it did prevent him from inheriting an even higher deficit. Additional talks targeting government spending have been postponed until March, which by then would have Trump as president, and Republicans inaugurated into both chambers of Congress.

Trump and Johnson, thus, both applauded the government's bipartisan bill this week. However, some Republicans like Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Chip Roy of Texas, were critical of the bill as it did not address spending hardly at all.

Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries, although not completely happy with the bill, did applaud the fact that it did keep government services afloat for a few more weeks.