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President Trump signs legislation to keep federal government open through February

Posted at 5:50 AM, Jan 22, 2018
and last updated 2018-01-22 23:30:43-05

President Donald Trump has signed legislation to keep the federal government open through February 8, the White House announced Monday night. The government will reopen Tuesday.

The signing comes after the House and the Senate passed the legislation earlier Monday afternoon.

The House passed the temporary funding bill in a vote 266-150. The Senate vote was 81-18.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer announced Monday that he and Senate GOP leaders have reached a deal to reopen the government.

"We will vote today to reopen the government," Schumer said on the Senate floor, saying he and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell had reached an "arrangement."

The movement comes thanks in part to commitments from McConnell and other Republicans in bipartisan meetings, according to four Democratic sources. Those sources say at least three Democratic senators who were no's before now plan to vote yes.

The vote comes several hours after the workday for hundreds of thousands of furloughed federal employees was supposed to have begun, and it comes three days after the government officially shut down Friday at midnight. Many of the shutdown's full effects were less visible during the weekend, when much of the federal workforce would typically be off anyway.

"I don't think this is the right way to get policy outcomes is to shut the government down. When we tried it, it didn't work well for us," GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina told reporters, appearing alongside GOP Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Jeff Flake of Arizona. "Here's what I predict. Once we start talking about immigration and voting on immigration, we'll find 60 votes to make sure these DACA recipients' lives are not ruined by March 5."

The Senate vote was moved from 1 a.m. ET Monday to noon after it became clear Democrats would block the spending bill over disagreements on a variety of issues, most notably what do about young people affected by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn of Texas said he thought Schumer of New York agreed to push back the vote to give his caucus "a chance to chew" on a GOP proposal to break the impasse.

"It's better to have a successful vote tomorrow at noon than a failed vote tonight," Cornyn told reporters.

A senior Republican aide told CNN Monday that McConnell wasn't planning to provide any firmer commitment on immigration than he already has.

"If that's not enough for Democrats, then we're in this for the long haul," the aide said. "If it's enough for Flake, and Graham, and Collins -- who want this done as much as they do -- it should be enough for Democrats."

Flake said Sunday night he was now a "yes" on the funding bill and it was his hope that six or seven more moderate Democrats would come on board to get the continuing resolution over the finish line -- to 60 votes -- to end the shutdown.

He said the Democrats still want something tangible on DACA but said it was problematic because it could run into the February 8 funding deadline.

He argued that they won a concession from McConnell that he isn't requiring President Donald Trump to sign off before an immigration bill moves to the floor.

"For the first time, we have the majority leader move off of we can only move something if the President agrees," Flake told reporters.

Earlier Sunday, Trump called for Senate Republicans to change the chamber's rules to resolve the funding impasse as the government shutdown continued into its second day. He tweeted a callfor McConnell to invoke the so-called "nuclear option" and thereby remove leverage for Senate Democrats.

Senate rules impose a threshold of 60 votes to break a filibuster, and Senate Republicans currently hold a slim majority of 51 votes, meaning even if they can unite their members, they need nine more votes to end debate. The White House is calling for the Senate to change its rules and move the threshold to a simple majority of 51 votes.

A spokesman for McConnell said in response to the tweet that the Senate Republican Conference does not support changing the 60-vote rule, a reiteration of Republican Senate leadership's already-stated opposition to the move Trump has called for over the past year.

Virginia Senators Tim Kaine and Mark Warner voted on Monday to end the shutdown. They released the following joint statement:

“We voted against the House Republican Continuing Resolution on Friday night because it left unaddressed too many priorities important to Virginians. We remain deeply disappointed that our Republican colleagues refused to keep the government open this weekend while we finalized a long-term deal on these issues. President Trump and Republican leadership have hurt Virginia and our military by governing from crisis-to-crisis and being unwilling to compromise.

“However, we are heartened by our work with more than 20 Senators from both sides of the aisle this weekend to create a bipartisan path forward to give Virginians long-term certainty and protect Dreamers.

“As a result of those discussions, we now have a path forward to resolve many of the challenges that Congress has punted on for months, including a long-term solution to sequestration and full-year funding for our government and the military. Today we are reauthorizing the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) that tens of thousands of Virginians rely on – after months of Republican obstruction – and giving servicemembers and federal employees peace of mind that their paychecks will arrive on time. We also have the opportunity to finally make investments here at home to fight the opioid crisis, provide relief for communities hit by natural disasters, allow those who rely on community health centers to get care, reform pensions, and much more.

“For more than three years, the Republican majority has blocked any viable effort to fix our broken immigration system. As recently as Friday night, Leader McConnell refused to commit to taking up the DREAM Act with any urgency. Today, Republican leadership has finally agreed to bring bipartisan legislation to protect Dreamers to the floor in the next three weeks, and both parties – as well as the American public – will hold them to it.”