House and Senate take different paths to avoid shutdown before midterms

Washington — Another deadline to fund the government is looming this fall in Congress, with members fresh off a series of shutdown fights that have left them eager to avoid another costly impasse ahead of the midterm elections.

But as lawmakers warn about the coming funding cliff, they have yet to agree on a path forward. Current funding expires at the end of the fiscal year on Oct. 1.

Last week, as the House appeared poised to move on a stopgap measure to keep the government funded, across the Capitol in the Senate, Majority Leader John Thune told CBS News that "we are in discussions on that," noting that "we're working on solutions to fund the government." This week, the two chambers appeared to be on different pages.

As the House prepared to vote on Tuesday on a measure to keep the government funded through the midterms, Thune announced that he intends to bring a separate continuing resolution to the floor before the August recess, citing "productive conversation on both sides of the aisle" on a funding measure.

Meanwhile, House Speaker Mike Johnson had been touting the lower chamber's GOP-led plan. House Democratic leaders have pushed back against what they said was a premature effort that comes with time to negotiate a bipartisan agreement.

The divergent strategies illustrated a key divide between the two chambers that has colored recent legislative fights. Both chambers have narrow Republican majorities. But the Senate must contend with a 60-vote threshold to advance most legislation, which requires support from Democrats, whereas the House can maneuver measures on a partisan basis.

Thune outlined Wednesday that he's asked Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the chair of the Appropriations Committee, to draft a "bipartisan and clean continuing resolution" to fund the government until after the midterms, adding that he intends to bring up the measure for a vote before the chamber breaks for the August recess. The majority leader said the Appropriations Committee is "hard at work" reviewing proposed funding adjustments from the Trump administration to "ensure we have a bipartisan product ready to move quickly."

Thune, a South Dakota Republican, has repeatedly spoken about the different dynamic in the Senate, and downplayed the two chambers' differing approaches on Wednesday.

"Everybody's going the same direction," Thune told CBS News. "It's just, we have a slightly … different process. We need Democrats over here."

The Senate was at the center of the 43-day shutdown last fall, when Democrats used funding the government as leverage to address expiri