House passes $1.4T spending bill; Senate, Trump expected to support

Dec. 17 (UPI) -- The House passed a $1.4 trillion spending deal Tuesday, bringing Congress one step closer to averting a government shutdown.

The chamber passed a pair of packages, one including four bills to fund Defense, Homeland Security, and Commerce-Justice-Science and Financial Services, while the other provides funding to Agriculture, Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, Energy, Interior, Transportation Housing and Urban Development, Veterans Affairs, and the Environmental Protection Agency.

The House passed the first bundle by a vote of 297-120 and the second by a vote of 280-138.

The package isn't "the bill I would have written on my own, but I am proud that we have been able to do so much good in this political environment," Rep. Nita Lowey, D-N.Y., chairwoman of the House appropriations committee, said.

The Senate is expected to pass the packages and President Donald Trump is expected to sign them, averting a potential government shutdown Friday.

The deal provides $7.6 billion in funding for the 2020 Census, a $208 million increase in funding for the EPA, a $22 billion increase in funding for the Department of Defense and a 3.1 percent pay raise for civilian federal employees.

An additional $25 million would be provided for research into gun violence while funding for a border wall, which was at the center of the record 35-day shutdown last year, would remain at its previous total of $1.375 billion.

It also includes provisions to raise the national age for tobacco sales to 21, reauthorize the Export-Import Bank of the United States and permanently repeal three Affordable Care Act taxes.

Daniel Uria contributed to this report.