House approves spending bill--barely

WASHINGTON—Capitol Hill dysfunction was on full display Thursday as both parties split over a massive spending bill almost everyone hates. Eventually the House passed the measure on a bipartisan vote, and the Senate is expected to do the same today, averting another government shutdown.

“Thank you, and merry Christmas,” House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said Thursday night after a coalition of 162 Republicans and 57 Democrats passed the $1.1 trillion package, 219 to 206.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he plans to allow a vote on the House bill on Friday and hopes it will pass. Opposition in the Senate will be led by liberals such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who firmly opposes a provision that would ease banking regulations, and conservatives such as Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who is incensed over immigration. But once Reid and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., forge an alliance, the fix is in and passage is only a matter of time.

The bill funds almost the entire government for one year. The biggest exception is the Department of Homeland Security, which is funded through Feb. 27 to set up a clash on President Barack Obama's immigration executive order, which could shield more than 4 million illegal immigrants from deportation.

A group of 67 conservative House Republicans opposed the bill because it didn’t immediately confront the president’s immigration action and increases spending by $88 billion over 2014 spending levels. The House technically remained under the spending caps imposed in last year’s Murray-Ryan budget agreement but only by classifying extra spending as emergency funding—including $64 billion to fight ISIS, $5.4 billion to fight Ebola, and $2.5 billion to process a backlog of Veterans Affairs disability claims.

“Once again Congress has failed to take seriously its responsibility to squarely address the federal spending crisis,” said Rep. Raúl Labrador, R-Idaho, who called the bill “outrageous” after voting against it. “The result is a 1,603-page bill larded with pork and favors for special interests.”

Democrats were no less upset. Hours before the vote, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California, delivered a rare public rebuke to the president, saying she was “enormously disappointed” he decided to embrace legislation she described as a Republican attempt at “blackmail” because of the banking provision. But Pelosi never lobbied Democrats to kill the bill, and Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland and No. 3 Democrat Jim Clyburn of South Carolina were a steadying force in support of the measure.

The White House stated its own objections to the bank-related proposal and other portions of the bill in a written statement. Even so, officials said Obama and Vice President Joe Biden both telephoned Democrats to secure the votes needed for passage. The president stepped away from a White House Christmas party reception line to make last-minute calls—securing them on his argument that any proposal passed by the Republican-controlled Congress next year would only be worse for Democrats.

Republican supporters of the bill touted several provisions, including an additional $60 million funding cut to the Environmental Protection Agency that will eliminate 2,000 positions. The measure also cuts almost $350 million from the Internal Revenue Service budget and requires Obamacare plans to disclose abortion coverage.

Critics said it would be weeks before the American public had a chance to find out what all is in the bill.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.