The Senate on Saturday passed a stopgap spending bill to avert a government shutdown at the end of September, in a bipartisan effort to head off a major spending skirmish before the midterm elections.
The vote was 90-6, with one senator voting present, to keep federal funding flowing at current levels through Dec. 11 and bar the Trump administration from transferring funds to the Border Patrol, a provision that Democrats had insisted on. It was unclear whether the agreement, which was negotiated by senators, could pass the House, though lawmakers there are also eager to avoid a shutdown fight before November.
The bill also would delay for a month a ban on intoxicating hemp products that is scheduled to go into effect in November, a provision inserted at President Trump’s request that generated a mini revolt and briefly threatened to derail the entire bill.
The passage of the interim spending legislation, more than a month before the Sept. 30 shutdown deadline, was a departure from the last-minute, buzzer-beater funding votes that have become the norm in Congress. But this time, both the political impetus of the midterm elections and the bitter experience of two previous government shutdowns over the past year incentivized senators to move quickly, greasing the way for a nearly painless passage.
“After three unnecessary lapses in funding during the fiscal year 2026 cycle, putting the possibility of yet another harmful shutdown off the table should be a priority for each and every one of us,” said Senator Susan Collins, Republican of Maine and the chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee.
Democrats celebrated the provision that sought to prevent the Trump administration from redirecting funding to Border Patrol, a measure that the party had been insistent about, and that was at the heart of the last government shutdown.
“This is an important step forward to prevent a shutdown no one wants and provide the runway we need to negotiate funding bills in the months ahead as we fight to rein in Trump’s corruption and make life more affordable for families back home,” said Senator Patty Murray of Washington, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee.
The Senate defeated a bid by a group of Republican senators to strip the delay of the ban on intoxicating hemp products from the bill. Heading off the restrictions, which Congress approved and Mr. Trump signed into law last year, would benefit the son-in-law of Susie Wiles, Mr. Trump’s chief of staff, who is the chief executive of companies that distribute and sell intoxicating-hemp-derived gummies and vapes with names like “Trainwreck” and “Blueberry Cookies.”
The provision created a temporary speed bump in the Senate’s consideration of the funding bill after Republican leaders, at the behest of the White House, tucked it into the stopgap legislation, a maneuver that infuriated some Republicans.
Critics argued that the ban was urgently needed to take aim at a multibillion-dollar industry of beverages, gummies, cookies and vapes that are sold in gas stations, vape shops and convenience stores that are not regulated like cannabis dispensaries.
“It’s no accident that these products are made to look exactly like something that a kid would want,” Senator Ted Budd, Republican of North Carolina, said in arguing for allowing the ban to take effect as scheduled. He warned that the hemp industry was seeking “to permanently entrench their intoxicating products into the machinery of government.”
But the administration defended the move as one that would help veterans and patients with pain management, and senators voted 61 to 32 to kill the proposal to remove the delay from the bill.
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