WASHINGTON — The lame-duck Congress is gaveling in for its final work session of 2016, and its last under President Barack Obama, as lawmakers face a Dec. 9 deadline for spending legislation to keep the government running.
A look at the legislation awaiting action:
• SPENDING: Work on 11 of the 12 annual agency spending bills has sputtered and a stopgap spending measure is keeping the government running until Dec. 9. Republican leaders have decided to punt the remaining measures into next year, in part because they may have better chances of winning additional Pentagon spending from the incoming Trump administration. Another temporary spending bill is in the works that would keep the government open until the end of March or later.
• FLINT’S WATER: A popular water projects measure — including $220 million to help Flint and other cities repair aging water systems that are poisoned by lead — is in House-Senate talks.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan have promised that Flint assistance will be approved in the lame-duck session.
• CURES ACT: The House plans to vote Wednesday on legislation beefing up brain, cancer and other research at the National Institutes of Health and accelerating the Food and Drug Administration’s approval processes for pharmaceuticals and medical devices. A Senate vote could come next week.
• DEFENSE: House and Senate negotiators hope to wrap up the defense policy bill, which Congress has passed every year for more than five decades.
House Republicans are seeking to use the must-pass $602 billion defense policy bill to reverse protections imposed against workplace discrimination by Pentagon contractors based on sexual or gender orientation. Another battle is over how much additional money to spend on weapon systems that the Pentagon didn’t request.
• IRAN SANCTIONS: Congress must act to renew a decades-old law that allows the United States to hit companies with economic sanctions for doing business with Iran. Congress first passed the Iran Sanctions Act in 1996. The sanctions law is to expire at the end of the year and there is strong bipartisan support for legislation that would extend it by another decade.
• ENERGY BILL: The House and Senate remain far apart as they seek to approve the first major energy bill in nearly a decade. Prospects for completion look dim as senators push provisions opposed in the House. These include speeding exports of liquefied natural gas and long-term authorization for a fund that promotes land and water conservation.
