Mike Johnson lays out appropriations timeline to avoid November shutdown

Speaker-designate Mike Johnson (R-LA) laid out his policy priorities as well as an expedited appropriations schedule to avoid a government shutdown just three weeks before federal funding is set to lapse.

In a “Dear Colleague” letter sent to House Republicans earlier this week, Johnson addressed Republican lawmakers with a sense of urgency to extend government funding with a plan to pass a stop-gap continuing resolution until Jan. 15 or April 15, 2024, as a way to give the House more time to advance all 12 of its appropriations bills.

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“We all understand that our next Speaker must be prepared to negotiate from a position of strength with the Democrat-controlled Senate and White House. The only way to secure that position is for the House to have passed all twelve of our appropriations measures,” Johnson wrote. “I am confident we can work together to accomplish that objective quickly, in a manner that delivers on our principled commitments to rein in wasteful spending, and put our country back on a path to fiscal responsibility. It will be challenging work, but we can and will do it.”

The letter was released just hours before the House is set to reconvene to elect its new speaker, with Johnson selected as the Republican nominee. If elected, Johnson must immediately begin work on passing the House’s spending bills to avoid a shutdown next month.

As part of that plan, Johnson told his colleagues he would push to vote on at least one appropriations bill funding Energy and Water Development as soon as this week. The remainder of the schedule would push for a vote on Legislative Branch, Interior and Environment, and Transportation during the last week of October; a vote on the Financial Services and General Government and the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies bills during the first week of November; and then a vote on the Labor and Health and Human Services as well as Agriculture during the week of Nov. 13.

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“This is an ambitious schedule, but if our Speaker can work across the Conference to unify our membership and build consensus, we can achieve our necessary objectives,” he wrote.

Johnson laid out a number of other priorities he would like to accomplish over the next several months, including a vote on a resolution to condemn Hamas following its attack on Israel and to begin negotiations on a slew of authorization bills, among other things. As speaker, Johnson also wrote he would not allow the House to break for its annual August recess next year unless “all 12 appropriations bills have passed the House.”