WASHINGTON –President Barack Obama has signed a $1.1 trillion spending bill to fund the government for the next year.
Congress approved the spending package earlier in the day, helping to avoid a government shutdown while funding federal agencies through next fall.
In a surprise, the House overwhelmingly approved the measure in a 316-113 vote. The Senate later backed the bill 65-33, sending it to Obama, who signed it into law Friday afternoon.
The lopsided House vote was a major victory for new Speaker Paul Ryan. He secured the votes of 150 Republicans — a majority of the House GOP conference. Ryan’s predecessor, John Boehner, rarely got that kind of backing from Republicans on a spending bill when he ran the House.
Obama called Ryan after the vote to thank him “for helping government work,” the speaker said. The president also invited Ryan to join him for a meal at the White House in the new year.
The passage was a win for House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi who took several last minute steps to assuage liberals in her caucus who threatened to torpedo the bill over concerns about lifting the ban on exporting oil in the bill and the lack of a bankruptcy provision in the bill to help fiscally stressed Puerto Rico.
Pelosi got commitments from congressional leaders and the White House to address Puerto Rico early next year, which eased the tension with the angry members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and Congressional Black Caucus.
Along with her top advisors, Pelosi told Democrats at a closed-door meeting that while they aren’t thrilled with the deal, there are still things in it worth supporting, such as a health program for 9/11 first responders and increased spending for other key domestic priorities. They warned if the bill didn’t pass, Republicans would still end up getting the tax cuts that were negotiated alongside the spending bill, and Democrats would be short-changing a host of programs they have fought to give more resources.
Conservatives complained that Ryan didn’t include some items they wanted, such as new restrictions on Syrian refugees coming into the country or limits on federal dollars for Planned Parenthood. But the speaker argued that in divided government, there was a limit to what Democrats could accept and said it contained “some big wins for the country, whether it’s lifting the oil export ban, increasing military spending or renewing health care for the 9/11 first responders.”
Ryan repeatedly stressed he doesn’t like rolling up all the spending bills, along with a myriad of policy provisions, into one measure.
