The US House of Representatives on Tuesday passed a temporary funding bill designed to prevent a potential federal government shutdown before the fiscal year ends on Sept. 30, authorizing funding to continue at current levels for federal agencies through Dec. 4.

The House approved the stopgap measure in a 220-205 vote. The bill received backing from 213 Republicans, six Democrats, and California Independent Representative Kevin Kiley. Only one Republican lawmaker voted against the bill.

The legislative step comes at a time when the House of Representatives has so far managed to approve only three separate appropriations bills, which cover national security, the State Department and related programs; agriculture, rural development, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and related agencies; and military construction, the Department of Veterans Affairs and related agencies.

In the Senate, Democratic and Republican members of the appropriations committees negotiating the budget have yet to resolve the impasse over government funding.

Representative Tom Cole, the Republican Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, assessed the situation during a speech on the House floor on Tuesday.

“The harsh reality before us is clear: the end of the fiscal year is outpacing our remaining work,” Cole said. “Our conference refuses to let Senate Democrats’ obstructionism and inaction trigger an artificial government shutdown at the end of September. That is why we are acting before a funding crisis occurs, rather than reacting to one.”

Cole added: “This short-term continuing resolution, free of any extraneous policy riders, keeps the government open, preserves the progress we have made, and maintains a path toward full-year appropriations.”

The temporary funding legislation also contains a provision authorizing payments of $174,000 each to Alfredia Scott, the widow of the late Democratic Representative David Scott, and to the legal heirs of Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who died earlier this month.

The majority of House Democrats strongly criticized the bill prior to the vote, arguing that the text was drafted without a bipartisan negotiation process.

Representative Rosa DeLauro, the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, outlined her position during a House Rules Committee hearing on Monday.

“If I am to support a continuing resolution, it must keep the government running, be free of poison pills, and protect Congress’s constitutional authority over spending decisions,” DeLauro said.

The measure approved by the House now heads to the Senate.

The bill is considered to have weak prospects of passing the Senate due to the chamber’s 60-vote threshold and anticipated opposition from Senate Democrats.

The US is facing the imminent risk of losing its status as a global agricultural superpower, according to an analysis by the Financial Times. In a report titled “The Decline of the American Agricultural Superpower,” the publication detailed how the country is on the verge of surrendering its leading position in global agricultural exports.

According to calculations by the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF), farmers will confront severe financial challenges next year in cultivating the core crops that historically established the nation as the global export leader.

Federation data indicate that production losses are projected to reach $138 per acre for soybeans, $167 per acre for corn, $145 per acre for wheat, and $406 per acre for cotton.

US Department of Agriculture (USDA) data show that the US registered $171 billion in agricultural exports last year. This figure is only $2 billion higher than the export volume of Brazil, which has capitalized on trade disruptions triggered by imposed tariffs.

Brazil, which broke records by increasing its exports by 6% to reach $87 billion in the first half of this year, ranks first globally in the production of soybeans, beef, and poultry. Additionally, it has surpassed the US in cotton exports.

Historically, the US developed its highly fertile lands during the 20th century, constructing a sophisticated network of silos, railways, and ports to produce grain far exceeding its domestic consumption, exporting the surplus abroad.

During this period, China became one of the primary buyers of US agricultural goods. As the American agricultural sector expanded, demand for soybean meal surged. Anticipating sustained growth in Chinese demand, American producers expanded their acreage and invested heavily in technology, storage facilities, and export terminals.

However, in 2018, Donald Trump introduced additional tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars worth of Chinese goods. Beijing retaliated, causing Chinese purchases of American soybeans to drop sharply.

“Our trade agreements change based on someone’s arbitrary decisions,” said Aaron Lehman, president of the Iowa Farmers Union, commenting on the situation. “The immense effort spent on building relationships, conducting honest cooperation, and resolving emerging issues can be wiped out overnight.”

The Trump administration provided approximately $23 billion in direct financial support to farmers across 2018 and 2019. However, farmer Corey Goodhue noted that cash aid did not resolve the underlying structural issue: “We don’t need payments; we need trade.”

In the trade vacuum created by the dispute, China shifted its soybean procurement to Brazil. Joseph Glauber, former chief economist at the USDA, noted that Brazil’s share of the global market by 2020 had already surpassed levels previously projected for 2025.

Glauber described this acceleration as startling, adding that the trade wars directly generated this outcome.

By the time Trump returned to the White House in January of last year, the vast majority of China’s soybean imports were already being supplied by Brazil.

“We lost some of the foreign buyers who were customers for our products five years ago, and they never came back,” Lehman said.

Producers complain that the Republican president’s second term has brought a new wave of tariffs and trade uncertainty. In contrast, the USDA maintains that the country has not lost its standing, pointing to a record level of $174 billion in agricultural exports. Department officials stated that the current administration is establishing connections with foreign buyers to open new markets, expand existing ones, and ensure producers do not remain dependent on a single buyer.

Wendy Johnson, a producer from Iowa, expressed that while many farmers initially believed the president’s actions would yield positive results, the uncertainty persists.

“The future is approaching, but we do not see any clear hope,” Johnson said. “Politically speaking, you do not want Midwest farmers to lose hope.”

The US Supreme Court struck down the tariffs introduced after Trump’s “Independence Day” declaration in April 2025 during the month of February. Following this ruling, the US President signed an executive decree imposing a 10% additional tariff on all countries for a 150-day period.

While this 150-day period is expected to expire on July 24, the US Court of International Trade ruled the additional tariffs unlawful.

The Financial Times reported that the US administration is currently preparing new tariffs ranging between 10% and 12.5% targeting 60 countries.

If the United States experiences an artificial intelligence-driven productivity boom in the coming years, it will translate into stronger economic growth, but the benefits to the nation’s fiscal outlook will remain limited.

With US public debt already high and rising rapidly, and given the lack of political will to reduce deficits through traditional measures such as spending cuts and tax increases, many have pinned their hopes on an AI boom to allow the country to grow its way out of its fiscal challenges.

However, new modeling from the Yale Budget Lab, reported by Axios, reveals that while an AI-driven productivity surge would improve the fiscal situation, the positive impact would not be as substantial as widely anticipated.

The primary reason is that a large portion of national income is highly likely to shift away from labor—which the US taxes at relatively high rates—and toward machines and software, or capital, which face lower tax rates.

The top federal income tax rate on labor income is 37%. In contrast, the corporate tax rate is 21%, while the top rate on long-term capital gains is 23.8%.

Furthermore, a significant portion of capital ownership is held through tax-exempt vehicles, such as retirement accounts and charitable foundations.

Consequently, even if companies generate higher profits through AI while spending less on human labor, these profits will not translate into the kind of revenue growth seen during past economic expansions, when the labor share of national income remained more stable.

In a scenario where AI provides only a slow boost to GDP growth, the Yale team’s model indicates there would be very little change in federal revenues by 2030.

Under a rapid AI-driven growth scenario, where annual GDP growth reaches 3.3% in the coming years and the labor share of income falls, federal revenues would increase by $216 billion in 2030.

According to the Congressional Budget Office’s baseline projection, the US budget deficit in 2030 will stand at $2.2 trillion.

This deficit figure is approximately ten times larger than the revenue increase projected under the Yale team’s most optimistic AI growth scenario.

“On the one hand, all else equal, faster productivity growth will yield more tax revenue,” wrote John Iselin and Ryan Nunn of the Yale Budget Lab. “On the other hand, our current tax system may not be structured to efficiently raise revenue from the economic activity AI creates.”

Speaking to Axios, Iselin added: “While we project that the growth of AI will increase tax revenues, without significant changes to how the US taxes capital income, the federal government will leave substantial revenue on the table.”

These projections are not definitive forecasts. The range of possibilities for how an AI boom might unfold and affect the fiscal landscape remains vast.

Axios highlights several critical questions:

How far will the labor share of income fall? How will this shift affect inequality among wage earners?

On the spending side, will the existing social safety net face massive liabilities to support displaced workers, or will job losses become so widespread that Congress is forced to offer more extensive aid than current laws dictate?

Tax policy is not set in stone. In a world where AI displaces human employment and the US faces a fiscal dilemma, Congress could consider shifting a greater share of the tax burden onto capital.

Ultimately, the objective is not to treat the Yale Budget Lab’s data as absolute truth. Rather, it is to demonstrate that the interaction between an AI-driven growth surge and federal tax revenues is not as direct or positive as those confronting an intractable deficit problem might hope.