With just one day left before the expiration of the current continuing resolution (CR) that is currently funding federal agencies, House and Senate leaders have announced a two year budget agreement that breaks the spending caps established under the Budget Control Act of 2011 (BCA). The agreement includes another short-term CR running through March 22 allowing appropriators time to draft new appropriations language that reflects the higher spending levels. Time is of the essence as the agreement and short-term CR need to be approved tomorrow in order to avert a government shutdown.

Bipartisan leadership in the House and Senate have been negotiating the contours of the agreement for some time. The agreement eliminates the non-defense discretionary and defense discretionary sequestration cuts of the BCA, and provides for equal increases above that relief for both defense and non-defense spending. This means an increase of $300 billion for defense and non-defense spending for Fiscal Year 2018 and Fiscal Year 2019, with defense spending seeing an increase of approximately $160 billion, and non-defense spending seeing an increase of approximately $128 billion. Also included in the agreement is more than $80 billion for disaster relief efforts.