Capitol Watch: September 8, 2026 — Shutdown Averted, Congress Races a December Funding Cliff | TIJ News

tij.news · Eduardo Bacci · September 8, 2026

Capitol Watch: September 8, 2026 — Shutdown Averted, Congress Races a December Funding Cliff | TIJ News

# Capitol Watch: September 8, 2026 — Shutdown Averted, Congress Races a December Funding Cliff

#### By Eduardo Bacci

September 8, 2026

The west front of the U.S. Capitol. (Architect of the Capitol via Wikimedia Commons, public domain)

WASHINGTON — Both chambers of Congress are in a pro forma week, with the House and Senate holding brief non-voting sessions Tuesday and Thursday before members return to Washington on Monday, September 14, according to the Senate floor schedule and the House Majority Leader’s calendar. But the quiet on the floor belies a consequential stretch of legislative activity: before leaving town, Congress cleared a stopgap funding bill that takes a government shutdown off the table until December 11, the House passed a contested higher-education measure with notable cross-party support, and a House committee voted unanimously to subpoena two of the most senior executives in American technology. Here is where things stand — and what records show is coming next.

Table of Contents

## Stopgap Signed: Government Funded Through December 11

The top action of the past week was the enactment of H.R. 9770, the Continuing Appropriations Act, 2027, which holds federal funding at current levels through December 11. The House voted 370-48 on September 1 to accept the Senate’s version of the measure, and President Trump signed it into law, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget’s appropriations tracker. The Senate had cleared the bill 90-6 in early August before departing for its summer recess, Government Executive reported.

The margins are worth pausing on. An earlier House-passed version, which would have funded the government through December 4, passed largely along party lines. The final product drew 370 votes — a genuinely bipartisan outcome in a chamber that has produced few of them this Congress. Reporting indicates the revised bill added two provisions Democrats sought: language temporarily blocking an Office of Management and Budget proposed rule that would place federal grant funding under review by political appointees, and a restriction on transferring funds from other programs to Border Patrol. House Appropriations Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., called the final version a “marked improvement” while cautioning it is “in no way a substitute for the full-year funding process.”

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., told reporters ahead of the vote that Congress is “going to avoid the threat” of another shutdown — a statement with real weight behind it. Federal workers have endured two funding lapses in the past two years, including the longest shutdown in history in late 2025, according to Government Executive’s reporting. House Appropriations Chairman Tom Cole, R-Okla., said the stopgap would let Congress “get past the November elections” and complete full-year bills in November and December.

## The Appropriations Scorecard: House Three for Twelve, Senate at Zero

The December 11 deadline now frames the fall. Fiscal year 2027 begins October 1, and the Congressional Research Service appropriations status table shows how much work remains: the House has passed three of the twelve annual spending bills, while the Senate Appropriations Committee has yet to report any of its FY2027 measures as bipartisan negotiations over topline discretionary levels continue, records compiled by CRFB indicate.

Cole acknowledged the math plainly, saying “the fiscal year deadline is outpacing the work that remains.” That leaves Congress a compressed post-election window — roughly four legislative weeks between the midterms and December 11 — to either assemble an omnibus-style package, pass individual bills, or fall back on yet another continuing resolution. For agencies, contractors, and grant recipients, filings and public schedules suggest the real appropriations fight has simply been moved to a lame-duck session.

## House Passes Anti-Boycott Certification Bill, 237-169

In its final votes before the break, the House on September 3 passed H.R. 4795, the Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act of 2026, by a vote of 237-169 (Roll Call 295). The bill, sponsored by Education and Workforce Chairwoman Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., with Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., as a lead Democratic backer, would require institutions of higher education participating in federal student aid programs to certify annually that they do not engage in commercial boycotts of a “major strategic partner” of the United States — language widely understood to target boycott, divestment and sanctions campaigns directed at Israel.

The vote breakdown recorded by the Republican Cloakroom’s floor wrap-up shows 33 Democrats voting in favor and two Republicans opposed — a meaningful cross-party bloc on a politically charged question. The Rules Committee record shows the measure was reported from committee by a 24-9 margin earlier this year.

Supporters frame the bill as a tool against campus antisemitism; opponents contend it conditions federal funds on restricting institutional expression, and critics quoted in coverage of the vote argue it will chill campus activism. The measure now moves to the Senate, where its path is uncertain — no companion floor action has been scheduled, according to available records.

## Veterans’ Affairs Panel Subpoenas Oracle Leadership Over EHR Cost Escalation

The most significant oversight development of the week came from the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, which voted 19-0 on September 2 to subpoena Oracle Chairman Larry Ellison and Oracle CEO Mike Sicilia over the Department of Veterans Affairs’ electronic health record modernization program, Nextgov/FCW reported. The unanimous, bipartisan vote followed a contentious committee hearing dominated by the VA’s announcement that it is extending its 10-year, $10 billion contract with Oracle by an additional $17 billion ceiling plus option years.

The subpoena motion came from Rep. Maxine Dexter, D-Ore., who said it followed Oracle’s decision to decline Chairman Mike Bost’s invitation to testify voluntarily. “When the vendor responsible for a taxpayer-funded contract going from $10 billion to roughly $27 billion will not sit at this table and answer our questions, all of us are being prevented from doing our oversight duties,” Dexter said, according to the hearing coverage. Criticism ran across party lines: Rep. Nikki Budzinski, D-Ill., called the revised deal “just a blank check for Oracle,” while Rep. Derrick Van Orden, R-Wis., characterized the extension in even harsher terms. Those statements are lawmakers’ characterizations, not adjudicated findings; Oracle has not publicly responded in the records reviewed for this digest, and the subpoenas compel testimony rather than establish wrongdoing.

VA Deputy Secretary Paul Lawrence defended the program, telling the panel “the program is back on track” and citing 11 successful system deployments in 2026, with plans to complete all rollouts by 2031. But testimony from the Government Accountability Office’s Carol Harris underscored why the committee wants sworn answers: GAO says VA still lacks a complete life-cycle cost estimate and an integrated master schedule, and Harris called the cost of maintaining VA’s legacy VistA system “a little bit of a black box.” Committee members also flagged 2022 Senate testimony in which Sicilia committed Oracle to fixing performance issues “at our expense” — a commitment lawmakers now want reconciled with the expanded contract ceiling. VA has previously estimated total program costs could exceed $56 billion over its life cycle, according to figures cited at the hearing.

## Senate Returns Monday to a Judicial Cloture Vote

When the Senate gavels back in at 3:00 p.m. on September 14, its first roll call — set for approximately 5:30 p.m. — will be a cloture vote on the nomination of Matthew R. Byrne

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