Government Shutdown Averted? Here's What We Know.

An autumn government shutdown could be averted next week – avoiding an awkward election season for lawmakers on the campaign trail. 

The House of Representatives is expected to vote on the Senate-passed continuing resolution to temporarily keep the federal government next week when the chamber returns from August recess, a GOP source independently confirmed to Townhall on Thursday.

The vote would be done “under suspension,” which means that two-thirds of the chamber will need to vote in favor of the legislation, according to Punchbowl News. A government shutdown would start Sept. 30 if a spending agreement was not reached in time. 

The wide margin passage is not an unlikely possibility, as the CR passed the Senate with hefty bipartisan support. The House had passed their own spending bill primarily along party lines in July, and Senate Republican leadership opted to work with Senate Democrats on a proposal instead.

Senate Majority @LeaderJohnThune (R-SD) demands the passage of a bill that guarantees funding through the November election and the December 4 deadline: "We owe the American people some certainty here." pic.twitter.com/Pw61R3omXh

— CSPAN (@cspan) July 30, 2026

The federal government dealt with a 43-day-long shutdown last year amid a dispute over “Affordable Care Act” subsidies. 

In addition, Democrats' long-term refusal to keep the Department of Homeland Security funded over immigration enforcement disagreements led to a nearly three-month DHS shutdown in the spring. A reconciliation bill that only required a simple majority in the Senate ultimately led to the DHS shutdown's end. 

“This CR also gives Congress the time that it needs to continue our work on bipartisan appropriation bills,” Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins (R-ME) said in her address earlier this month in favor of the bill’s passage in the upper chamber.

“Senate passage of this continuing resolution would be a major step toward averting a damaging shutdown that could harm vital programs and throw the lives of federal workers into disarray,” she said. “We saw what happened in the shutdowns that occurred during the last cycle, that were both unwarranted and unfair to so many of our federal employees, particularly those who were forced to work without knowing when they would be paid. We cannot allow that to happen again.”

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