Shutdown Averted: Boehner, Reid Reach Short-Term Agreement on Budget

House speaker John Boehner has released a statement jointly with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid:

We have agreed to an historic amount of cuts for the remainder of this fiscal year, as well as a short-term bridge that will give us time to avoid a shutdown while we get that agreement through both houses and to the President.  We will cut $78.5 billion below the President’s 2011 budget proposal, and we have reached an agreement on the policy riders.  In the meantime, we will pass a short-term resolution to keep the government running through Thursday.  That short-term bridge will cut the first $2 billion of the total savings.

The rider banning funding of abortions in the District of Columbia (a long-standing policy known as the Dornan amendment) is a part of this deal, but the Planned Parenthood defunding was not included. The House will vote on that issue separately, after which the bill is likely to be voted down in the Democratic Senate.

For now, however, the government will remain funded for at least the next six days.