WASHINGTON -- Congress adjourned Thursday for the election after maneuvering a stopgap spending bill through both chambers the day before. President Barack Obama swiftly signed the spending bill into law.
But lawmakers leaving Washington already are looking ahead to a lame-duck session and a weighty to-do list already piling up for next year.
The must-pass spending bill, agreed to after a protracted struggle, extends government funding until Dec. 9 and addresses the Zika crisis with $1.1 billion in aid, months after Obama initially requested federal assistance. Lawmakers advanced spending for flood victims in Louisiana and a compromise to help victims of lead-tainted water in Flint, Mich.
When they return to Washington after the election, lawmakers will have to complete the annual appropriations process, which fell apart this year even though getting it on track was a top priority for the leaders of Congress' GOP majorities, House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wisconsin and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. Only one of the 12 must-pass annual spending bills has been completed.
"This is what divided government gets you," Ryan said Thursday. "You don't always get what you want in divided government."
Congress and the next president, whether Republican Donald Trump or Democrat Hillary Clinton, will confront a series of tasks pushed off into 2017 by a catch-all budget deal negotiated under the former House speaker, John Boehner, on his way out the door last year.
Among those tasks, the debt limit will need to be raised by around midsummer, something that has provoked political infighting in recent years.
Lawmakers will need to revisit major programs, including the Children's Health Insurance Program under Medicaid, along with payments to hospitals and community health centers and expiring tax credits for a range of industries. There's also the annual budgeting process, a defense policy bill, reauthorization of the Federal Aviation Administration and a Supreme Court vacancy to fill.
"Given the heavy weight of some those issues, some of them are not going to be delicate by any stretch of the imagination," said Rep. Mark Sanford, R-S.C.
"Ryan will have a decision to make," said the second-ranking House Democratic leader, Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland. "Do I want to be perceived as the leader of the obstructionist party, or do I want to be seen as the constructive opposition which works with the president and the Senate to achieve progress?"
Before getting to next year, lawmakers must first get through the postelection lame-duck session.
Ryan is holding out hope for progress on criminal justice reform legislation sought by Obama and members of both parties, but McConnell suggested Thursday that was unlikely. And Obama is pushing hard to advance his trade deal for Asia, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, but McConnell and Ryan have indicated that is unlikely. McConnell has said repeatedly that he has no plans to advance Obama's Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland, this year.
Beyond that, lawmakers must complete a water projects bill with the Flint money in it and could come together around a medical research bill.
Before leaving town, congressional leaders devoted some of Thursday to blaming one another for their slim record of accomplishments so far this year, taking credit for what did happen, and insisting that if nothing much happens in the lame-duck session it will be the fault of the other party, not their own.
"My hope is that after the election, they'll drop their political shenanigans and we'll get on at doing the serious business of actually appropriating," Ryan said of Democrats.
Democrats, of course, begged to differ.
"Republicans have not done their basic work of government," said Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. "And that is the truth."
Information for this article was contributed by Mary Clare Jalonick of The Associated Press.
A Section on 09/30/2016