The Senate has scheduled a vote on a CR to reopen the government for Monday at noon. The CR will reportedly be the same as the previous CR, funding CHIP and eliminating the Cadillac tax, but it will not address DACA or Dreamers. To clarify, negotiations remain ongoing, and this is not a deal. Rather, it is the same bill passed by the House that failed to gain cloture in the Senate with a different date — February 9 vs. February 16.
Stay tuned.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) held a procedural vote, known as a cloture vote, to end debate and move on to voting with the the four-week continuing resolution (CR) that the House passed earlier this week. After holding the vote open for over an hour, the measure failed to receive the 60 votes needed end debate.
After cloture was rejected, McConnell announced that he would ask senators to vote on a CR through Feb. 8 in the near term — presumably after the weekend, so terms can be negotiated.
The federal Office of Personnel and Management posted the following status at 1:38 am EST. “Due to a lapse in appropriations, Federal government operations vary by agency. Employees should refer to their home agency for guidance on reporting for duty.”
The federal government is shut down.
All sides think that they are going to win the public opinion in any shutdown fall out.
Stay tuned.
The House voted 230 – 197 to approve a continuing resolution (CR) that would fund the government through February 16 and renew the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) for six years. It does not include any immigration provisions to address DACA, Dreamers, or the border.
The measure goes on to the Senate.
The Trump Administration announced today that it intends to nominate Alex Azar as the next Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS). Azar served at HHS under the George W. Bush Administration from 2001 to 2007, first as general counsel and deputy secretary. He served in senior leadership roles at Lilly USA between 2007 and late 2016.
The first HHS Secretary in the Trump Administration, Tom Price, resigned earlier this fall due to the fallout over his use of chartered flights.
A Washington Post/“60 Minutes” investigation, which aired this weekend, examined Rep. Tom Marino (R-PA) efforts to guide legislation that weakened the Drug Enforcement Administration’s ability to go after drug distributors, even as opioid-related deaths continue to rise.
Marino was the Administration’s nominee for the position of Drug Czar. He has withdrawn his name from consideration.
President Trump has also promised a major announcement about opioids next week.