China News Service, Beijing, January 19th: Washington News: The U.S. Senate and House of Representatives voted to pass an interim budget bill on the 18th local time to avoid a "shutdown" of some federal government agencies at midnight on the 19th.
In the vote that day, the Senate passed the interim budget with 77 votes in favor and 18 votes against.
Subsequently, the House of Representatives also passed the budget with a vote of 314 in favor and 108 against.
It is worth mentioning that the opponents of the vote in the House of Representatives mainly came from far-right conservative members of the Republican Party.
The interim budget will maintain the normal operation of some federal government agencies until March 1, 2024, and maintain the operation of other government agencies until March 8, 2024.
During this period, the two parties still need to continue to negotiate and reach an agreement on the full-year budget for fiscal year 2024.
White House Press Secretary Karina Jean-Pierre said that day that President Biden would sign the interim budget bill.
She also urged House Republicans to work with Democrats to pass a full-year budget as soon as possible.
According to US media reports, Johnson, a conservative Republican congressman who was elected Speaker of the House of Representatives in October last year, chose to cooperate with Democrats in order to pass the interim budget. However, Johnson's move aroused dissatisfaction from the far-right forces in the House of Representatives Republicans.
Some Republican congressmen said that Johnson is currently in a "difficult situation."
In October last year, former House Speaker McCarthy aroused strong dissatisfaction from the far-right forces for cooperating with Democrats to reach an interim budget bill, which directly led to Republican conservative Congressman Gates proposing to remove McCarthy, and he was eventually dismissed.
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