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U.S. Congress approves short-term government spending bill

Xinhua, December 12, 2015 Adjust font size:

U.S. House of Representatives on Friday passed a short-term government spending bill to avoid a government shutdown hours before midnight when current short-term spending bill will expire.

The bill was approved by the Senate on Thursday and President Barack Obama is expected to sign it into law.

The short-term bill will fund the government until Dec. 16 and give lawmakers several more days to reach a 1.15-trillion-U.S. dollar funding bill to pay for government operations through next September.

But congressional Democrats and Republicans are dividing over some key issues in the long-term bill. Republicans are planning to add conservative policies, such as lifting crude oil export ban, renewing expiring tax breaks, and halting the Syrian refugee program, into the spending bill, which the Democrats are opposing to.

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said on Friday that her party could not support a measure to renew expiring tax breaks and warned that it must be separated from a 1.15-trillion-U.S. dollar government spending bill needed to avoid a government shutdown next week. Enditem