Government Shutdown Potentially Avoided (Again)  

Late Wednesday, February 28, congressional leaders announced a tentative funding deal to avoid a partial government shutdown on March 1 and a full shutdown on March 8. Top appropriators have made some progress on bills to fund the federal government for the remainder of the current fiscal year, but not with enough time to pass all twelve by 11:59 p.m. on March 1. As of Wednesday evening, with votes expected today, the tentative deal provides a stopgap for six bills (Agriculture-FDA, Energy-Water, Military Construction-VA, Transportation-HUD, Interior-Environment and Commerce-Justice-Science) at prior fiscal year funding levels to March 8. Negotiations have closed on these, and lawmakers expect to pass the full measures next week. The remaining fiscal 2024 measures would be pushed to March 22, as there remains work to be done on those more contentious bills. 

Compounding what is already a difficult situation, if lawmakers fail to pass full-year bills by April 30, the debt-limit deal adopted last year would mandate billions of dollars of cuts to defense and nondefense programs. GFOA will continue to monitor and report developments as they occur.