The House of Representatives tried but failed to pass three emergency
funding bills Tuesday, amid much political finger pointing by both
parties in the wake of the potentially drawn out stalemate over the
budget.
The three measures were aimed at reopening parks and monuments,
continuing veterans’ benefits and allowing the municipal government of
the District of Columbia to function.
But even before the House voted, the bills appeared doomed. Senate
Democrats suggested GOP House members had picked high profile parts of
the government to fund as a cover for their part in forcing a government
slowdown, while overlooking other critical areas such as the National
Institutes of Health.
“We support veterans, parks,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid
Tuesday afternoon. “But we can’t and we won’t be forced to choose
between parks and cancer research or disease control or highway safety
or the FBI.”
The White House also rejected the bills in advance.
“The president and the Senate have been clear that they won't accept
this kind of game-playing, and if these bills were to come to the
president's desk he would veto them," said White House spokeswoman Amy
Brundage. "These piecemeal efforts are not serious and they are no way
to run a government.”
Mike Steel, spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner, fired back,
“How does the White House justify signing the troop funding bill, but
vetoing similar measures for veterans, National Parks, and District of
Columbia? The President can't continue to complain about the impact of
the government shutdown on veterans, visitors at National Parks, and DC
while vetoing bills to help them. The White House position is
unsustainably hypocritical."
The failed measures were treated by House GOP leaders as suspension
bills, meaning they needed a two thirds majority to pass. The parks
funding bill went down by a tally of 252 to 176, the veterans programs
by 264 to 164 and the D.C. government funding by 265 to 163.
The two chambers tried in vain earlier to reach a budget resolution.
Shortly after midnight, the House endorsed an approach that delays the
federal health care law's individual mandate while prohibiting
lawmakers, their staff and top administration officials from getting
government subsidies for their health care.
They formally urged the
Senate to form a conference committee -- a bicameral committee where
lawmakers from both chambers would meet to resolve the differences
between the warring pieces of legislation.
Meeting Tuesday morning, the Senate rejected the proposal, in a party-line, 54-46 vote.
Both sides dug in, with Republicans insisting that any spending bill
include provisions to chip away at ObamaCare, and Democrats refusing to
allow it.
Both sides were hard at work blaming the other for the state of affairs.
"It's time for Republicans to stop obsessing over old battles. I
mean, I say to my Republican friends, ObamaCare is over. It's passed,
it's the law," Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid said.
President Obama, speaking from the Rose Garden Tuesday afternoon,
tried to put pressure on Republicans to allow a "clean" budget bill.
"Republicans in the House of Representatives refused to fund the
government unless we defunded or dismantled the Affordable Care Act.
They've shut down the government over an ideological crusade to deny
affordable health insurance to millions of Americans. In other words
they demanded ransom just for doing their job," Obama said.
He noted the GOP did not succeed in shutting down ObamaCare, a large part of which opened officially on Tuesday.
Elsewhere in Washington, House Republicans were pressuring Democratic
senators to meet them at the negotiating table to hash out a budget
package.
The House appointed "conferees" overnight who would -- if the Senate
agrees -- participate in a conference committee to craft a budget bill.
Those GOP representatives held a press conference Tuesday to note that
Democrats were nowhere to be found at that negotiating table.
"All of us here (are) sitting at a table waiting for the Senate
Democrats to join us so we can begin to resolve our differences," House
Republican Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., said.
"The way to resolve our differences is to sit down and talk. And as
you can see, there's no one here on the other side of the table," he
said.
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