President Donald Trump has signed a bill ending the longest government shutdown in United States history.
It comes hours after the House of Representatives voted to restart disrupted food assistance, pay hundreds of thousands of federal workers and revive a hobbled air-traffic control system.
House members made their long-awaited return to the nation’s capital this week after nearly eight weeks away.
Republicans used their slight majority to get the bill over the finish line by a vote of 222-209.
Mr Trump’s signature on the bill, which cleared the Senate earlier in the week, will bring federal workers idled by the 43-day shutdown back to their jobs starting as early as Thursday.
However, it remains unclear just how quickly full government services and operations will resume.
“We can never let this happen again,” Mr Trump said in the Oval Office during a late-night signing ceremony that he used to criticise Democrats.
“This is no way to run a country.”
Air travel, food aid impacted
The shutdown’s end offers some hope that services crucial to air travel, in particular, will have some time to recover.
Restoration of food aid to millions of families may also make room in household budgets for spending as the Christmas shopping season moves into high gear.
It also means the restoration, in the coming days, of the flow of data on the US economy from key statistical agencies.
The absence of data had left investors, policymakers, and households largely in the dark about the health of the job market, the trajectory of inflation, and the pace of consumer spending and economic growth overall.
Some data gaps are likely to be permanent, however, with the White House saying employment and Consumer Price Index reports covering the month of October might never be released.
The funding package will also allow eight Republican senators to seek hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages for alleged privacy violations stemming from the federal investigation of the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol by Mr Trump’s supporters.
It retroactively makes it illegal in most cases to obtain a senator’s phone data without disclosure, and allows those whose records were obtained to sue the Department of Justice for $US500,000 ($762,000) in damages, along with lawyers’ fees and other costs.
Shutdown took increasing toll on country
Democrats wanted to extend an enhanced tax credit expiring at the end of the year that lowers the cost of health coverage obtained through Affordable Care Act marketplaces.
They refused to go along with a short-term spending bill that did not include that priority.
But the Republicans said that was a separate policy fight to be held at another time.
They eventually prevailed, but only after the shutdown took an increasing toll on the country.
“We told you 43 days ago, from bitter experience, that government shutdowns don’t work,” Republican Tom Cole said.
“They never achieve the objective that you announce. And guess what? You haven’t achieved that objective yet, and you’re not going to.”
‘This fight is not over’
The shutdown has magnified the stark partisan divisions within Congress, with that split reflected when representatives debated the measure on the House floor.
The Republicans said the Democrats sought to use the pain generated by the shutdown to prevail in a policy dispute.
“They knew it would cause pain, and they did it anyway,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said.
Meanwhile, the Democrats said the Republicans raced to pass tax breaks earlier this year that they say mostly will benefit the wealthy.
Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries said the Democrats would not give up even if the vote did not go their way.
“This fight is not over. We’re just getting started,” Mr Jeffries said.
A Reuters-Ipsos poll released on Wednesday found that 50 per cent of Americans blamed Republicans for the shutdown, while 47 per cent blamed the Democrats.
