Yuri Gripas/Reuters House Speaker Paul Ryan
- House Republicans rolled out their bill to avoid a government shutdown and fund the government for around a month.
- The funding extension will push back the deadline for a shutdown from January 19 to February 16.
- The bill will also include extras like funding for the Children's Health Insurance Program and a delay of some Obamacare taxes.
House Republicans released their plan to fund the government for a short time and avoid a shutdown at the end of the week.
The plan will extend the deadline for a shutdown until February 16 from the current January 19 dropoff using a continuing resolution (CR). The CR will extend the current level of funding for most federal programs for nearly a month.
In addition to the funding extension, the plan tacks on a series of healthcare, tax, and military funding changes.
Some of those extras reportedly include:
- Funding for the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) for six years: The funding for the CHIP program lapsed in September, but was sustained through a series of short-term cash infusions from Congress. The extension will help ensure that the roughly nine million children who get healthcare coverage from the program remain insured.
- Delay of some Obamacare taxes: The bill will suspend the medical-device and health insurers taxes as well as delaying the implementation of the so-called Cadillac tax on high-end insurance plans.
- Extension of a number of key programs: The bill also extends funding for a number of critical programs from the Department of Energy's Inspector General office to NASA's core space exploration programs to the Department of Agriculture's Child Nutrition programs.
Whether or not the bill will pass is questionable. Democrats have demanded that any funding bill include a codification of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) immigration program. Additionally, Republican defense hawks have bristled at the idea of another CR instead of steady, long-term funding for the military.
Outside of the House fight, the plan will also need some support from Senate Democrats in order to avoid a filibuster in that body.