Odds of a government shutdown in September are rising fast

Congress is mostly back from its 17-day observance of July 4th. The Senate returns to work Monday afternoon while the House returns on Tuesday, with just 12 legislative days before the scheduled August recess. That means 12 days to set the stage for preventing a government shutdown at the end of September. In both chambers, Republicans are choosing to continue policy fights over abortion. In the House, the threat of total chaos remains constant. The prospects for a successful July are thus looking pretty bad.

Nonetheless, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer set out an ambitious July agenda in a letter to Democratic colleagues released Sunday. He’s got spending bills and a raft of policy items he wants to work through this month, along with a raft of President Joe Biden’s executive and judicial nominees. There are bipartisan bills on rail safety, and allowing legal cannabis sellers access to regular banking services is on the docket, as well as individual department funding bills.

Additionally, the Senate Judiciary Committee is going to push out a bill to impose an ethics code on the Supreme Court. That could come to the floor this month as well, where it will almost certainly be blocked by Republicans. Because of the political salience of the bill, Schumer might choose to hold it back and have the vote at a time when it won’t be competing with so many other issues—like funding the government.