The US House of Representatives has passed a 1.1tn dollar budget hour before government was due to shut down at midnight on Thursday. The Republican measure passed by 219 votes to 206 after President Barack Obama had urged Democrats to support the measure.
It will fund most of the government until September 2015, but some areas will only receive emergency funding.
Republicans won control of both House and Senate in elections last month.
A relieved John Boehner, the Republicans' House leader said: Thank you and Merry Christmas.
The party strongly opposes President Obama's immigration reforms and so the bill only funds the Department of Homeland Security until February.
Republicans hope that when the new congress meets at the start of next year, they can force changes to the president's plans.
The bill must now be passed by the Senate and send to the president to sign into law.
The bill funds the government at the same levels that were negotiated last December.
It also adds emergency funding requested by President Barack Obama, including funds to fight Ebola in West Africa and money for US air strikes against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.
As presented earlier in the week, the 1,600 page bill also includes a number of provisions intended to gain votes from both parties: increasing the amount an individual person can contribute to a national political party from $32,400 to $324,000; blocks the District of Columbia from using its own funds to set up regulatory systems for marijuana legalization; measures that would significantly weaken new regulations about risky financial instruments called swaps; blocking certain Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations; cuts in the budgets of the EPA and the US tax agency; increases in the budget for Wall Street regulation agencies, including the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Top Comments
Disclaimer & comment rulesyou couldn't lend us some could you,
Dec 12th, 2014 - 08:53 pm 0that's an awful lot of dosh.
still,
as long as it help you guys, just spend it wisely..
It's a budget, not actual real ca$h money. It's more of a finance plan, based on debt-management and offset future income. Still, it is of figures other countries can only dream of dealing with...
Dec 12th, 2014 - 11:36 pm 0Good Luck to them, when America sneezes, the world catches cold, and Lat Am gets influenza,,,
Be careful what you wish for, little trolls....
In this globally inter-connected world I do wonder why the 'left' in Lat Am is still fighting Cold War battles. Unless it is to keep the population in fear and dependent on the State?
Surely not?
This omnibus weakens Dodd-Frank and makes a tax payer bailout of Wall St. much more likely.
Dec 13th, 2014 - 04:06 am 0Commenting for this story is now closed.
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