The Latest: House passes bipartisan budget and debt deal

WASHINGTON – The Latest on a bipartisan budget and debt deal in Congress (all times local):

5:12 p.m.

A hard-won, bipartisan budget and debt compromise between President Donald Trump and Speaker Nancy Pelosi has easily passed the Democratic-controlled House.

The bill would head off another government shutdown, permit the Treasury to borrow freely to pay the government’s bills, and lock in place recent budget gains for the Pentagon and domestic agencies.

It’s a must-do measure that represents a relatively rare moment of detente in Trump’s Washington.

The legislation would take care of the two biggest items on Washington’s essential agenda. It would suspend the debt limit for two years to avert a first-ever default on U.S. payments and override draconian spending limits to prevent $125 billion in automatic spending cuts from hitting government agencies

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3 p.m.

Buoyed by the strongest endorsement yet by President Donald Trump, the House is taking up a bipartisan budget and debt deal that would head off another government shutdown.

It would also permit the Treasury to borrow freely to pay the government’s bills, and lock in place recent budget gains for the Pentagon and domestic agencies.

The hard-won agreement between the administration and Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi lifts the limit on the government’s $22 trillion debt for two years and sets a $1.37 trillion cap for the agency accounts funded by Congress each year.

It amounts to a cease-fire to allow lawmakers to navigate through a series of tricky fiscal deadlines without politically exhausting battles.