GOP unveils spending bill, setting up showdown with Democrats

Congressional Republicans unveiled a federal funding bill that bolsters defense spending but cuts all other expenditure, setting up a showdown with Democrats as a government shutdown looms.

Typically, the two parties craft compromise plans that can make it through both houses of Congress in order to keep the US bureaucracy functioning. But GOP lawmakers have largely shut Democrats —who argue defense and non-defense spending should move in the same direction — out of the drafting process this time, with House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson “betting that Republicans can muscle the legislation through,” the Associated Press said. That will mean Senate Democrats have “little choice but to back his measure or shut the government down,” Semafor’s Principals newsletter noted.