Three of Trump's spending bills advance through US Senate with bipartisan deal

The Senate approved the first three spending bills of Donald Trump’s 2025 budget agenda on Friday, moving fast after party leaders reached a bipartisan agreement earlier in the day to wrap them into one legislative package.

The push comes with less than two months to go before federal money runs out on September 30. Even though these three bills alone won’t prevent a shutdown, they give the chamber a stronger position heading into talks with the House and the White House.

In a lopsided 87-9 vote, the Senate cleared two bills: one to fund the Department of Veterans Affairs and military construction, and another for the Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration.

Senators then voted 81-15 to pass a separate third bill to cover spending for the Legislative Branch. All three are now heading to the House as a bundled package.

Senate lawmakers fight over amendments, funding clawbacks, and VA staffing

Altogether, the bills will direct $154 billion to military and veterans programs and more than $27 billion to the Agriculture Department and the FDA, both amounts representing about a 2% boost from current funding levels.

Appropriations Chair Susan Collins, a Republican from Maine, said during the debate, “It’s taken a great deal of work, good faith and negotiation to get to this point. Congress has a responsibility, a constitutional responsibility under Article I, for the power of the purse. We are executing that responsibility.”

Still, the legislative process wasn’t smooth. Senators clashed over proposed changes to the package. Jeff Merkley, a Democrat from Oregon who sits on the Appropriations Committee, offered an amendment that would have blocked the White House from using rescission powers to claw back any of the funds.

Merkley said Democrats were worried that Trump’s administration would submit another rescissions request before the fall deadline, derailing any broader funding deal. His amendment was rejected.

Appropriations Committee ranking Democrat Patty Murray of Washington defended the agreement that was reached in the chamber. She said the bill “rejects damaging cuts from Trump and House Republicans.”

Another amendment, offered by Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Alex Padilla of California, was adopted without a recorded vote. It bars the use of any funds to reduce services offered by the Veterans Crisis Line. That’s one of the few amendments that made it through.

Other proposals were blocked, including a Democratic amendment that would’ve forced the VA to issue a report on staffing cuts, and another to halt the reorganization of the Agriculture Department. Republicans tried to chip away at the Agriculture-FDA funding too. John Kennedy of Louisiana and Rick Scott of Florida both proposed deeper cuts to that section. Their amendments didn’t survive.

Congressional funding bill passes separately after Kennedy’s demand

The Legislative Branch bill had its own drama. It only came to a vote after John Kennedy, who’d previously slammed the $7.1 billion price tag, demanded the ability to oppose it separately. “I think we need to set an example,” Kennedy said on the floor before the vote. Though the bill passed, his no vote was logged.

Once approved, the Legislative Branch bill was added to the previous two and sent over to the House in one batch, part of the deal Collins outlined earlier in the day.

The votes marked a sharp turnaround from Thursday night, when things nearly fell apart. Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat from Maryland, had blocked a four-bill package that included funding for the Justice and Commerce departments.

Van Hollen was furious that the Trump administration had backed out of a years-long plan to move the FBI’s headquarters to Maryland, killing bipartisan talks on the DOJ budget. Because of that, the Justice-Commerce funding debate was kicked until after the Senate returns from its August recess.

With the September 30 deadline approaching fast, pressure is building. The three spending bills passed Friday won’t be enough to keep the government open. Lawmakers are now weighing whether to pass a continuing resolution, a temporary measure to extend current funding past October 1. If they don’t act, parts of the federal government could go dark.

Some in the House want another long-term stopgap bill. Senate leaders, though, want a handful of full-year funding bills signed by Trump before time runs out. That would guarantee long-term funding for some departments through fiscal 2026, while the rest of the government operates under a short-term extension.

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