Sen. Bingaman predicts failure on annual approps bills, calls for House to pass a temporary spending measure for 2012

“It is clear to all of us that we will not have passed and sent to the President all appropriations bills by that time,” said Bingaman. “I urge before the expiration of the current Continuing Resolution that the House enact and send to the Senate a funding bill which extends to the end of the current fiscal year.”

Bingaman said he is calling on the House, where spending measures are constitutionally supposed to originate, to move the such legislation in an attempt to create stability by avoiding the sort of standoff that has threatened government shutdown in the past.

Bingaman remarked that crafting such a measure for FY 2012 ought not to be difficult since spending levels were already set by August’s deal to raise the federal debt ceiling.