Lawmakers Think They Will Need Some Short-Term Funding Bills to Avoid a Partial Shutdown in January

Congressional appropriators already anticipate needing some short-term funding bills at the end of January, and are especially doubtful Congress will come to an agreement on Department of Homeland Security funding.

Both chambers recently passed three appropriations bills for fiscal year 2026 alongside a continuing resolution to extend government funding through Jan. 30. The Senate left this week without accomplishing Republican leadership’s goal of teeing up the defense appropriations bill — or any of the five appropriations bills that have been approved by the full committee for months.

Getting that package ready is the next “challenge,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune told reporters Wednesday, adding that they’re working through holds.

House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole told NOTUS on Wednesday night that his chamber should be able to come to an agreement on anything the Senate is able to pass, though he’s talked with Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins about his preference to move fewer bills at a time rather than a five-bill package or “minibus.” Negotiations on anything the Senate gives the house will start “immediately,” Cole said.

But a partial CR is “possible” at this point, and Cole is “mostly worried” about the four bills the Senate has not yet passed out of committee — Energy-Water, Financial Services, Homeland Security and Department of State and Foreign Operations. The House has passed all of its appropriations bills out of committee, but typically that process is an easier lift. More negotiations are necessary in the Senate where Democrats will be needed to get a bill over the 60-vote threshold.

“If we can’t get our business done by Jan. 30, I just assume wrap it up and we’ll move on to the next year,” Cole said. “That would take a collective decision, and that’s not a threat to people, but we need to get our work done.”

Any bills not passed by Jan. 30 should get year-long CRs, in Cole’s opinion. He told NOTUS that he would allow subcommittees a few extra days if needed to finish their work.

“It’s going to be tough enough in an election year,” Cole said. “We’re going to need the time.”

The proposed five-bill package is a first attempt to avoid any kind of CR, Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, a Senate appropriator, told NOTUS.

“There may be CRs for certain ones of those,” Capito said of the four bills still in committee. “Hopefully we can get these five over the finish line. That would be 90% of government funding.”

One major potential hold up: the Department of Homeland Security.

Several other Republicans, including Sen. John Hoeven, who chairs the Appropriations subcommittee on Agriculture, echoed Capito’s thinking.

“Could one or more of the other bills that haven’t made it across end up as part of a CR? For example, something like DHS, where we have more trouble getting an agreement with the Dems, something like that? Possible,” Hoeven told NOTUS.

Sen. Katie Britt, who chairs the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on DHS funding, told NOTUS that the Senate’s attention won’t be on her bill, or the other three that aren’t out of committee, until the first five have passed.

She was “hopeful” the DHS bill could be finished by the deadline, but her House counterpart, Rep. Mark Amodei, told NOTUS that he expects the DHS bill will need a continuing resolution. Dynamics in the Senate on Homeland Security issues “are not conducive to, ‘OK, what do we agree on and what do we not agree on?’” Amodei said.

With the administration using DHS funds from the reconciliation bill and moving around existing funds, “poison pill riders are not an issue” during this appropriations cycle, Amodei said. And though in theory that should make negotiations easier, “the problem is, under the CR there’s still hundreds of millions of dollars” that are appropriated to the Biden administration’s priorities.

“It’s frustrating because you want to move on and put your stamp on this,” Amodei said.

Any full-year CRs wouldn’t be “a win,” Amodei said. He added that he hopes it doesn’t come to that, “but I’m not getting that tattooed.”

“I’ll put it this way: The end is not in sight,” he said.

Sen. Mike Rounds, another appropriator, told NOTUS that he doubts Democrats and Republicans will ever come to an agreement on DHS’s funding bill.

“Homeland Security is on the list [for a CR], but I’m not sure what the others might be,” Rounds said.

Discussions were underway among appropriators this week. The House Appropriations subcommittee chairs met Wednesday morning to discuss where their bills were at progress-wise. And the four corners of the Appropriations committees — Cole, Collins, and ranking members Rep. Rosa DeLauro and Sen. Patty Murray — met Thursday.

Overall, Republican appropriators expressed optimism about the next steps in the government funding process, with some telling NOTUS they feel confident their funding bills will be complete ahead of the deadline.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, the chair of the Appropriations Interior subcommittee, said the House and Senate bills are “pretty close.” Rep. Mike Simpson, her House counterpart, said the funding bill should be finished by the first week of December. Rep. Ken Calvert, who chairs the House Appropriations subcommittee on defense, said his bill was “moving along.” And Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart, who chairs the House Appropriations subcommittee on national security, Department of State and related programs, also told NOTUS he’s “confident” his bill will be finished before Jan. 30.

“I’m actually very optimistic,” Díaz-Balart said. “A full-year CR would be so devastating.”

“We, as a committee, are singularly focused on getting back to regular order and getting these done, and I’ve never seen unity like this on the committee since I’ve been on there,” Rep. Mark Alford told NOTUS. “It makes me happy.”

Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur, the ranking member on the Appropriations subcommittee for energy and water development, told NOTUS the funding bill is “ready to go.”

“We’re next up, if they would just throw the ball,” Kaptur said. “We’re ready. I’m hoping the leadership … they’ll do whatever they have to to put this on a grease-lightning path, for the sake of the country.”

Collins said Wednesday that she thinks her chamber is close to a consensus on the nine appropriations bills left.

“They’re going well,” Collins said. “We’re starting to work off the holds to find out what it is that people really want. In a lot of cases, it’s just an amendment.”

When NOTUS asked Collins whether she expected to see any CRs, she answered simply.

“I hope not.”