Breaking Advocacy Update: Congress, White House Reach Agreement to Fund Government Through January 2026
As widely reported, the full Senate on Monday passed a modified version of a Continuing Resolution designed to keep the federal government funded through Jan. 30 next year by a final vote of 60 to 40. That CR was paired with a so-called “minibus” of three appropriations bills designed to also fund Fiscal Year 2026 military construction projects and Department of Veterans Affairs operations, FY26 operations for the Department of Agriculture, and FY26 resources for the operations of the U.S. House and Senate.
The House, in turn, passed that same measure (Senate Amendment to H.R. 5371, the Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act, 2026) Wednesday night by a vote of 222 to 209, following several hours of debate. This action came after fourteen unsuccessful attempts by the Senate to advance a prior “clean” stop-gap House bill that would have funded the government through November 21, 2025. President Donald Trump immediately signed the funding measure into law on Wednesday night.
Go deeper: In addition to temporarily ending the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, H.R. 5371 (as amended) would also reverse more than 4,000 federal layoffs (and prevent any future layoffs through January). Importantly for our industry, the package would also reauthorize the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) through January 30, 2026 and “re-open” FHA for new multifamily loan applications. It also contains a narrow set of technical corrections to MBA-supported Public Law 119-31 (previously H.R. 1815) that restored VA Home Loan program partial claims authority as a loss mitigation option for servicers (pending the new law’s implementation by the VA).
A bipartisan group of senators successfully negotiated (and “whipped” the needed votes to pass) the Senate solution to end the funding stalemate after assurances from the White House and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) that a vote on extending a set of expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies would be scheduled to take place in the Senate during the second week of December.
Why it matters: As reported these last several weeks, MBA prepared a detailed member guide that outlined the impacts the funding impasse would have on single-family and multifamily government lending programs. The prolonged shutdown necessitated furloughs and other Reductions in Force (RIFs) of many federal employees, curtailing operations at key agencies such as HUD (FHA and Ginnie), Treasury, the VA, and USDA. To avoid long-term disruptions to the housing and flood insurance markets, MBA and a broad industry coalition strongly advocated for a restoration of NFIP program authority.
Moreover, MBA issued a November 7 press statement from CEO Bob Broeksmit, CMB, calling for lawmakers to bridge their differences and end the shutdown as quickly as possible. That action was buttressed by a November 10 statement from MBA and a broad coalition of financial trade groups that “welcomed news of the bipartisan deal to reopen the government” and “urged lawmakers to support the [negotiated] agreement.”
What’s next: Lawmakers will continue discussions aimed at enacting the remaining elements of an FY26 spending package (or individual FY26 appropriations bills) for all affected federal agencies prior to January 30, 2026. MBA will continue to urge key administration officials and congressional leaders to quickly strike a durable FY26 funding agreement that emphasizes our industry’s key priorities and avoids any further disruptions to the national economy – and the housing and real estate ecosystems.
For more information, please contact Bill Killmer at (202) 557-2736, Pete Mills at (202) 557-2858 and Jamie Woodwell at (202) 557-2936.
