The US House of Representatives and Senate adjourned on Thursday, paving the way for the current partial government shutdown to continue into the new year, when Democrats are taking control of the House.
Although both bodies of Congress returned to work on Thursday, the brief session signaled that little, if any, progress had been made toward settling a spending bill stalemate between Congress and the White House, which is demanding $5 billion to fund US President Donald Trump’s vision of a border wall along the US’ southern border with Mexico.
Trump’s $5 billion demand for the border wall was previously included in a House-passed bill, but that piece of legislation didn’t make it through the Senate by the deadline on December 21, according to the Washington Examiner, which noted that rejected spending bills have only offered up between $1.3 billion and $1.6 billion for border security.