Headline RoundupSeptember 18th, 2023

House GOP Spending Deal ‘Dead on Arrival’ as Senate Pursues Bipartisan Package

Summary from the AllSides News Team

House Republicans reached a deal on a bill to fund the government through October 31, with some provisions that will likely make it a non-starter in the Democrat-controlled Senate.

The Details: The bill would cut about 8% from all non-defense budgets except for the Department of Veterans Affairs, resulting in a cut of about 1% in the overall budget. It also includes measures from an immigration bill passed by House Republicans in May, and it lacks additional funding for Ukraine. 

For Context: The bill was negotiated by the self-described pragmatic Main Street Caucus and the more conservative Freedom Caucus — the same group that opposed the debt ceiling deal earlier this year. However, the bill has been criticized by some hard-line Republicans — enough that it could fail to pass even in the House. 

Hope for Bipartisanship? House Democrats, who oppose the GOP bill, sent Speaker Kevin McCarthy a letter on Sunday urging him to drop Republicans' party-line bill and instead put the Senate's bipartisan appropriations bill up for a vote. However, some conservative Republicans have threatened to pull their support for McCarthy’s speakership if he compromises with Democrats. 

How the Media Covered It: While there were some partisan differences, news coverage across the news media described the bill as “dead on arrival” in the Senate. While The Daily Signal (Right bias) called the bill’s immigration provisions “conservative border security legislation,” The New York Times (Lean Left bias) called them “tough Trump-era border initiatives.”

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