Congress keeps punting on the hard work, then leaving town for recess
The latest stopgap funding bill gave lawmakers an early-March deadline, but now their schedules call for a light workload in February
Once the House on Thursday finished kicking the can on government funding until early March, lawmakers did what almost comes naturally at this point.
They left town for a 10-day break, not returning until the night of Jan. 29.
Exempting half-days that are scheduled for traveling into or out of Washington, the House has only five full legislative days on its calendar before lawmakers leave Feb. 16 for what is slated to be an almost two-week break from the Capitol.
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Instead, House Republicans have set themselves up with at least seven more weeks of haggling over these agency budgets. Now two weeks since agreeing to stick with the original $1.66 trillion outline, congressional leaders and top members of the Appropriations committees have yet to agree on slicing up that pie, which is the only way for Congress to then approve the 12 bills covering all the agencies.
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