Republican-controlled House passes 2026 funding, undoing key Trump cuts

The Republican-controlled House overwhelmingly passed annual funding measures on Jan 22, reversing some of US President Donald Trump’s most controversial federal spending cuts, including restoring money for medical research, refugee assistance and even the Department of Education.

The Senate is expected to approve the House’s four-part package, along with two other Bills already approved by the House, before a Jan 30 shutdown deadline.

The White House said Mr Trump intends to sign the spending measures, putting Washington on track to avoid a disruption to government services.

The Trump administration may still try to withhold funding for programmes it opposes by asserting an expansive view of its executive authority. But Democratic lawmakers expressed confidence that courts would be more likely to force the administration to release funds once new Bills are enacted and signed by the President.

 “The courts are our friends,” said Representative Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, the top-ranking Democrat on the Appropriations Committee. “It’s critically important to reaffirm that the power of the purse resides here.”

Party leaders worked out a deal to separate Homeland Security Department (HSD) spending, allowing many Democrats to vote against funding immigration raids while still allowing the overall set of Bills to move forward to the Senate. 

The Homeland Security funding Bill passed 220 to 207, with seven Democrats supporting it. The vote on funding for the departments of Defence, Labour, Health and Human Services, Transportation and Housing and Urban Development was 341 to 88.

Republicans supported the compromise Bills, arguing that spending remains below Biden-era levels.

The spending package sent to the Senate maintains some cuts championed by the White House and Mr Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), including the elimination of the US Agency for International Development and all federal funding for public broadcasting.

It also ends a temporary pause on federal employee layoffs. 

“Getting everybody to work together, to put this together, helps us show that we can control our own house, and we can control the spending in this country,” said Republican Representative Dave Joyce of Ohio, a member of the Appropriations Committee. 

The measures increase funding for the National Institutes of Health despite Mr Trump’s efforts to cut back medical research centres and maintain funding for the Department of Education, which Mr Trump has sought to eliminate.

Government data collection at the Bureau of Labour Statistics is boosted rather than cut, the agency that gives grants to museums is kept alive, and the federal housing agency gets US$37 billion (S$47.4 billion) more than Mr Trump wanted.

Transit projects opposed by the administration, such as New York’s Gateway tunnel and Amtrak, are funded, along with billions of dollars for lawmakers’ pet projects.

The US$1.2 trillion package includes $839 billion in defence funding, about US$8 billion more than the Trump budget requested, in line with a long tradition of Congress providing the Pentagon with more weaponry than it sought.

House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries said that Republicans agreed to reject some proposed spending cuts to programmes like housing assistance after off-year elections showed voters are concerned about the economy. 

“A lot of progress has been made in the appropriations process addressing issues of concern,” Mr Jeffries said. 

Senate Democrats are expected to supply the votes needed to pass the Homeland Security funding Bill, despite opposition from House Democrats. At least seven Democrats will be required to end a Senate filibuster.

Top Senate Democrat spending panel member Patty Murray argued that a shutdown of the HSD would not affect Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), noting that Mr Trump secured US$75 billion in multi-year funding for immigration raids as part of his tax Bill.

Progressive groups are urging Democrats to take a firmer stance on funding ICE. But Democratic leaders appear reluctant to embrace a shutdown over any attempt to “abolish ICE” in an election year or to jeopardise a hard-won compromise reversing many DOGE cuts. 

Mr Jeffries stopped short of calling on Democratic senators to block the combined package over ICE’s campaign of raids in Democratic cities, citing “progress” on other priorities. 

The funding measures, if passed by the Senate and signed into law by the President, will complete funding for the US government through the Sept 30 end of the federal fiscal year. BLOOMBERG