Biden signs temporary spending bill that heads off a government shutdown

SAN FRANCISCO — President Biden signed a short-term government funding bill on Thursday, avoiding a potential government shutdown and pushing into next year debates about wartime funding for Ukraine and Israel.

Biden's approval came a day after the Senate overwhelmingly approved the stop-gap spending bill. The measure, designed by new House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., funds four federal agencies until Jan. 19, 2024 and the rest until Feb 2, 2024. The goal is to give Congress more time to negotiate long-term spending bills.

The president is in San Francisco for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, so the bill came out West for his signature. What the measure doesn't include is any of the funding Biden has said is urgently needed for Ukraine and Israel.

But the legislation keeps the lights on, and despite earlier reservations, once it was clear it would pass Congress, the White House signaled Biden would sign it.

At this point there is no clear path for those funding requests to even come up for a vote. [Copyright 2023 NPR]