US government shutdown ends but new deadline looms

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US President Donald Trump signed a temporary funding bill to end a three-day government shutdown late on Monday evening – but key issues remain unresolved, with funding due to expire on February 8.

The House of Representatives earlier voted 266-150 after the Senate earlier passed the bill by an 81-18 margin. The federal government is expected to be back in business on Tuesday.

US Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell gestures to reporters after lawmakers struck a deal to reopen the federal government on Capitol Hill in Washington, US, January 22, 2018. /Reuters Photo

Senate Democrats dropped their opposition to the short-term funding bill after securing assurances over a vote on the “Dreamers,” the estimated 700,000 people brought to the US illegally as children but at risk of deportation after Trump rescinded an Obama-era program protecting them.

The stopgap bill approved on Monday includes a six-year extension of the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP), which provides health insurance for nine million children.

New deadline on horizon

The disagreements between Republicans and Democrats on immigration and a wall on the Mexico border remain unresolved, with funding for the government due to expire again in little over two weeks.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer hit out at the role Trump played in negotiations as he announced his party would vote with Republicans to end the three-day shutdown on Monday.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer walks from a Democratic caucus meeting during the third day of a shut down of the federal government in on Capitol Hill in Washington, US, January 22, 2018. /Reuters Photo‍

"The White House refused to engage in negotiations over the weekend,” Schumer said. “The great deal-making president sat on the sidelines.”

Trump, who stayed in Washington at the weekend rather than attend an event in Florida marking his one-year anniversary as president, said he was “pleased Democrats in Congress have come to their senses.”

Congress has until February 8 to piece together a long-term budget deal, but the fate of the “Dreamers” remains in limbo.

Democrat splits exposed

Schumer said he expected Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to make good on a pledge to address Democrat concerns over the Deferred Action on Child Arrivals (DACA) program that protects the “Dreamers” but expires on March 5.

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However, fellow Democrats questioned the promise. “I refuse to put the lives of nearly 700,000 young people in the hands of someone who has repeatedly gone back on his word,” Senator Kamala Harris, a potential Democrat candidate for president in 2020, tweeted of McConnell.

Democratic Congressman Luis Gutierrez accusing his party’s senators of giving in: "They caved. They blinked. That's what they do."

“Today’s cave by Senate Democrats－led by weak-kneed, right-of-center Democrats－is why people don’t believe the Democratic Party stands for anything,” said Stephanie Taylor, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee.

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Senate Democrats who voted against the funding agreement included potential 2020 presidential candidates Harris, Bernie Sanders, Kirsten Gillibrand, Cory Booker and Elizabeth Warren.

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