For weeks, the White House has pressed Congress to pass new funding in order to keep up the federal government’s testing capabilities and purchasing power of therapeutics and vaccines. Senate negotiators struck a bipartisan agreement on Monday to replenish those funds. But a day later, the GOP blocked a procedural vote over an immigration-related public health order.
Republicans and a group of Democrats are pushing back on President Joe Biden’s decision to roll back a Trump-era order, Title 42, which has allowed the expulsion of migrants and asylum-seekers because of the pandemic’s health threat since March 2020. Biden will end those restrictions on May 23.