Budget, debt deal clears Senate, heads to Trump

Author: Associated Press / WINK News
Published: Updated:
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., walks to the Senate chamber for votes on federal judges as a massive budget pact between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and President Donald Trump is facing a key vote in the GOP-held Senate later, at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, July 31, 2019. Many conservatives in the Republican-led Senate are torn between supporting President Donald Trump and risking their political brand with an unpopular vote to add $2 trillion or more to the federal debt. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., walks to the Senate chamber for votes on federal judges as a massive budget pact between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and President Donald Trump is facing a key vote in the GOP-held Senate later, at the Capitol in Washington, Wednesday, July 31, 2019. Many conservatives in the Republican-led Senate are torn between supporting President Donald Trump and risking their political brand with an unpopular vote to add $2 trillion or more to the federal debt. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

A bipartisan budget and debt deal has passed the Senate and is heading to the White House for President Donald Trump’s signature.

Thursday’s vote addresses a worrisome set of Washington deadlines as Trump’s allies and adversaries set aside ideology in exchange for relative fiscal peace and stability.

The measure would permit the government to resume borrowing to pay all its bills and would set an overall $1.37 trillion limit on agency budgets approved by Congress annually. It also would remove the prospect of a government shutdown in October and automatic spending cuts.

But a tea party senator, Republican Rand Paul of Kentucky, says the legislation really is a spectacular failure because it will add hundreds of billions of dollars to the country’s spiraling debt.

In a tweet, Florida Sen. Rick Scott said the country can not continue operating with a trillion dollar deficit.

“We have to figure out how to live within our means,” Scott said, “& this deal does just the opposite.”

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