White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said Friday that President Barack Obama would sign a short-term continuing resolution to fund the Department of Homeland Security to prevent a shutdown of the agency.

“If the president is faced with a choice of having the Department of Homeland Security shut down or fund that department for a short term, the president is not going to allow the agency to shut down,” Earnest told reporters at the White House daily press briefing. “It represents an abject failure of leadership on the part of the new Republican majority to not get this done.”

Earnest’s comments came as the House of Representatives prepared to vote on a three-week DHS funding bill and after the Senate passed a “clean” bill funding the department through Sept. 30.