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 But House Speaker Paul Ryan said he was confident of a bipartisan
compromise and that there is "no reason to believe we're going to
have a shutdown" of the federal government, which would hurt the
U.S. economy.
The deal, reached late on Tuesday after weeks of wrangling, includes
a $1.15 trillion U.S. government spending bill and a companion $650
billion package of tax breaks.
The Republican-controlled House will vote on extending the tax
breaks for corporations and individuals on Thursday and the
"omnibus" spending bill which would fund the U.S. government through
September 2016, on Friday, lawmakers said.
Meantime, the House and Senate passed and sent to President Barack
Obama a temporary funding bill to keep the government running
through next Tuesday, by which time leaders hope the massive funding
measure will have been approved. Without the stopgap measure, money
for federal programs and offices would have run out at midnight
Wednesday.
Some Republican fiscal hawks balked at the massive funding bill,
raising questions about the overall level of support for it in the
House, although conservatives were not talking about shutting down
the government. It was unclear whether opponents had the votes to
stop the measure.
The government last shut down in 2013 for more than two weeks due to
a fight in Congress over the Obamacare healthcare program. Hundreds
of thousands of federal workers were furloughed.
Representative Jim Jordan told Reuters some members of the Freedom
Caucus he heads, and other conservative Republicans, would vote
against the spending bill because it failed to include provisions to
tighten U.S. screening of Syrian refugees, address national security
concerns and deny funding to Planned Parenthood, a target of
abortion rights opponents.
The White House reacted positively to the deal, saying it met
Obama's priorities without including "hundreds of needless
ideological" extra measures.
HISTORIC OIL ACCORD
Lifting the prohibition on oil exports would be a historic move and
a win for the U.S. oil industry and Republicans, who had argued that
the ban was a relic of the 1970s Arab oil embargo. But with U.S.
output falling as oil prices slump, analysts say it could be months
or years before exports flow in large volumes.
In a partial victory for Obama and other Democrats, the spending
bill would grant tax incentives to boost wind and solar development.
Shares of solar companies rose sharply.
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But House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said she was concerned
American oil refinery jobs could be lost by lifting the crude export
ban.
"There are concerns we have about jobs, that jobs would leave the
country because of lifting the ban on crude oil exports," Pelosi
told reporters.
She also cited worries about costly corporate tax breaks, telling
reporters they amounted to "practically an immorality."
As often happens with "must-pass" legislation, lawmakers added in
seemingly unrelated measures to the overall deal to increase chances
of approval in Congress.
Under changes to the "visa-waiver" program tucked into the spending
bill, citizens of 38 countries, including many in Europe, will face
new restrictions on travel to the United States. U.S. officials have
been eyeing the program since last month's Islamic State attacks in
Paris.
Companies that share data with the U.S. government for
cyber-security purposes will get more protection from consumer
lawsuits.
The bill will also repeal U.S. meat labeling laws, removing the
threat of retaliation by Canada and Mexico against $1 billion a year
in U.S. exports.
While there was no financial bailout for Puerto Rico to ease its
fiscal crisis, an omission Pelosi criticized, Ryan said the House
would work to address the problem by the end of March.
At the beginning of this year, Senate Majority Leader Mitch
McConnell boasted of using the appropriations process to roll back
major Obama administration environmental initiatives. But at year's
end, Republicans have fallen short of doing so.
(Additional reporting by Doina Chiacu, David Lawder, Patricia
Zengerle and Dustin Volz; Writing by Alistair Bell; Editing by Bill
Trott and Alan Crosby)
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