[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 40 (Wednesday, March 6, 2024)]
[Senate]
[Page S2220]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                           Government Funding

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, with just a few days to go before 
Friday's funding deadline to keep the government open, both Chambers 
must continue working quickly, decisively, and with bipartisan 
cooperation to avoid a shutdown.
  The House will vote today on the six appropriations bills we reached 
bipartisan agreement on, where I expect they will pass with strong 
bipartisan support. As soon as the House passes these appropriations 
bills and sends them to the Senate, I will put the bills on the floor 
so we can pass them and fund these six departments with time to spare 
before Friday's deadline.
  It took a lot of bipartisan cooperation to reach this agreement on 
these six appropriations bills. Now, it will take more bipartisan 
cooperation to finish the job.
  The appropriations process hasn't been easy in divided government, 
but after a lot of hard work, late nights, and persistence, we now have 
six strong appropriations bills that include aggressive investments in 
American families, moms and kids, veterans, workers, and more. And we 
prevented any devastating cuts or poison pills pushed by the hard 
right.
  We will fully fund WIC, meaning no mom or kid will be denied vital 
nutrition assistance. We will protect funding to help Americans, 
especially rural Americans, afford their rent and keep a roof over 
their head. We will increase funding for programs and services that 
support our veterans. And in this year's appropriations, we prevented 
the worst of the devastating cuts and poison pills pushed by the hard 
right.
  Passing these bills will give us the much-needed momentum to pass 
this package of spending bills by the March 22 deadline. But as I have 
said repeatedly, it will take bipartisan cooperation to finish the job.