Congress approved another short-term spending measure Thursday that would keep one set of federal agencies active until March 8 and another set until March 22, avoiding a shutdown of parts of the federal government that would otherwise take effect Saturday. The bill now goes to President Biden to be signed into law.

The short-term extension is the fourth in recent months, and many lawmakers expect it will be the last for the current budget year. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said negotiators had finalized six of the annual spending bills that fund federal agencies and were close to final agreement on the others.

We will get the job done, Johnson said as he left a closed-door meeting with Republican colleagues.

The House of Representatives took action on Thursday. The vote to approve the extension was 320 to 99. It easily met the two-thirds majority needed for approval. Democrats voted overwhelmingly to prevent a partial shutdown. But the vote was much more divided: Republicans were 113 in favor and 97 against.

The Senate then took up the bill and approved it in an evening vote by a vote of 77 to 13.

If we pass this bill, thank God we will have avoided a shutdown with all its damaging consequences for the American people, Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said just before the vote.

Biden called Thursday night’s vote good news for the American people, but added: I want to be clear: This is a short-term solution, not a long-term solution.

Next week, the House and Senate are expected to take up a package of six spending bills and deliver them to the president by March 8. Then, lawmakers would work to fund the rest of the government by the new March 22 deadline.

By the end of the process, Congress is expected to have approved more than $1.6 trillion in spending for the budget year that began Oct. 1. 1. That amount roughly matches the previous budget year and is what former Speaker Kevin McCarthy negotiated with the White House last year before eight disgruntled Republican lawmakers joined Democrats a few months later and voted to oust him from office.

Some of the most conservative members of the House of Representatives wanted deeper cuts to non-defense programs than the agreement allowed through the spending caps. They also sought a series of policy changes that Democrats opposed. They hoped the prospect of a shutdown could bring more concessions.

Last time I checked, Republicans actually have a majority in the House of Representatives, but you wouldn’t know that from looking at our checkbook because we are more than willing to accept Joe Biden’s policy choices and spending levels Nancy to continue. Pelosi, said Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.).

But Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.) refuted those comments before the vote, saying shutdowns are harmful and encouraging lawmakers to vote for the short-term extension.

“I want the American people to know, Mr. Chairman, that these negotiations have been difficult, but shutting down the government at a time like this would hurt people who should not be hurt,” Fleischmann said.

Divisions within the GOP conference over spending and their slim majority in the House of Representatives have bogged down efforts to get the bills passed in a timely manner. With the Senate also struggling to complete work on all twelve appropriations bills, lawmakers have resorted to a series of short-term measures to keep the government funded.

Republican leaders said the broader funding legislation, which is up for a vote in March, would lead to cuts for many non-defense organizations. By breaking up the spending bill into pieces, they hope to avoid an omnibus bill: a huge, all-encompassing bill that lawmakers generally have little time to digest or understand before voting on it. Republicans promised there would be no omnibus this time.

“If you take away Defense and Veterans Affairs, the rest of the agencies are going to face budget cuts in many cases,” said House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.). There are also some policy changes that we have made. House that will be in the final product, some of which are of course still being negotiated.

The temporary extension funds the Ministries of Agriculture, Transportation, the Interior and others through March 8. It funds the Pentagon, Homeland Security, Health and Human Services, and the Department of State through March 22.

Although congressional leaders have said they have reached final agreement on what will be in the first package of spending bills to be voted on next week, there is still room for a standoff over the second package to be voted on later this month are voted.

We work in a divided government. “That means that to get anything done, we must work together in good faith to achieve reasonable results,” said Washington state Sen. Patty Murray, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee.

The renewed focus on this year’s spending does not include the separate $95.3 billion aid package the Senate approved earlier this month for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, with much of that money being spent in the U.S. to boost U.S. to replenish military arsenal. The bill also included approximately $9 billion in humanitarian aid for civilians in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, Ukraine and other war zones.

In his statement Thursday, Biden said: It is time for Republicans in the House of Representatives to put our national security first and take urgent action to get this bipartisan bill to my desk.

Biden had called congressional leaders to the White House on Tuesday, where he and others urged Johnson to also move forward with the relief package. Schumer said the U.S. cannot afford to wait months before providing more military aid to Ukraine, which is short of the weapons and ammunition needed to fend off Russia’s military invasion.

“We have a lot of priorities in front of us, but we have to get the government funded and secure our border and then get everything else right,” Johnson told reporters after leaving his meeting with GOP colleagues.

Democrats pushed for faster action on Ukraine as the stopgap spending bill was discussed.

Without swift action, the legacy of this Congress will be the destruction of Ukraine, the appeasement of a dictator and the abandonment of starving children and needy families, said Representative Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee.