Lawmakers reaching an agreement on a two-year budget and debt ceiling increase now could play a significant role in avoiding another government shutdown in the fall. “That will set the topline spending numbers for both fiscal year ’20 and ’21 and that will allow the House and Senate Appropriations Committees to begin their work in earnest in trying to write the funding bills for the upcoming fiscal year,” said Reece Langley, Vice President of Washington Operations for the National Cotton Council.
There is optimism in getting some of the funding bills enacted by October, along with other bills such as the ag spending bill passed sometime in the fall, to avert another government shutdown. “That’s very positive news on the Congressional front and the fact that that’s getting done now will hopefully clear the pathway for Congress when they come back in early September to turn their attention to the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement,” Langley noted, “and try to get that through both the House and Senate in September-October, before the end of this year.”
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