House Republicans voted early Sunday morning for a temporary spending bill, a CR that includes a one-year delay for ObamaCare. The move both averts a government shutdown and increases the chance of a government shutdown with Harry Reid and Senate Democrats backed by the White House vowing to reject the measure ahead of a Monday night deadline.
The Republican-led House passed the proposal 231-192 in one of two amendments attached to a Senate spending bill passed Friday night.
The lower chamber also passed an amendment 248-174 to repeal the health-care law’s medical-device tax and unanimously voted 423-0 to approve a bill to pay the military on time if a temporary shutdown should occur. The final tallies came in after midnight, and the House adjourned until 10 AM ET Monday, shortly thereafter.
“I don’t think we’re near the precipice of a shutdown,” House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said after the votes. “We are on the precipice.”
The vote to delay ObamaCare went along party lines, with two Democrats joining the Republicans in voting for the amendment and two Republicans voting against the amendment, while 17 Democrats voted with every Republican member of the House to repeal the medical-device tax.
“Why are we doing this?” asked Tennessee Republican Rep. Marsha Blackburn, an amendment sponsor. “We know that ObamaCare is not ready for prime time.”
The White House and Harry Reid D-NV, and leader of the Democratic-led Senate made it clear hours before the final votes that they would not accept the plan.
“To be absolutely clear, the Senate will reject both the one-year delay of the Affordable Care Act and the repeal of the medical device tax,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. “After weeks of futile political games from Republicans, we are still at square one.”
Within minutes of the final vote, the White House vowed President Obama would veto the plan, resulting in the federal government “technically” running out of money Monday night and forcing a partial shutdown.
Failure to pass a short-term funding bill – also known as continuing resolution or CR – means we are headed for the first partial government shutdown in almost 20 years.
“ObamaCare is not ready, and the delay is essential,” California GOP Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Affairs, said before lashing out at a reporter. “How dare you assume this will be a failure. … How dare you.”
When ased what he thought Harry Reid would do when the Senate comes back Monday afternoon, House Speaker John Boehner said that, “We’ll see.”
The tax on medical devices is one of the administration’s main sources for funding ObamaCare, which starting Tuesday will begin accepting customers seeking insurance and providing coverage Jan. 1, 2014.
The House earlier this month sent a spending bill to the Senate that called for defunding the law. The bill that the Senate returned Friday to the House had the ObamaCare funding restored and funds the government through Nov. 15, after Senate Republican leaders failed to unite with Senators Ted Cruz R-TX, Mike Lee R-UT, Marco Rubio R-FL and a few others, who stood with the House Republicans.
The Senate’s vote was strictly along party lines, which would prevent a shutdown of nonessential government services. That tally followed a 79-19 vote to stop the “sorta” filibuster by Cruz.
All 52 Democrats, two independents and 25 of the 44 Senate Republicans voted in favor, which included Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and most of the GOP leadership. GOP Senate leadership seemed perfectly content siding with the Democrats, sounding more like Pelosi D-CA, than Republicans who campaigned on doing everything in their power to stop Obamacare.
“The Senate has acted in a clear way to keep government open,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said Saturday. “Instead, House Republicans are insisting on not one but two proposals to shut down government.” The House proposal will fund the federal government – except for ObamaCare – through December 15.
Sen. Cruz was doing some whipping up of votes in the House on his own, urging conservatives to continue the battle over heath care and to reject efforts by Speaker Boehner and other GOP leaders to offer scaled-back assaults on the law like repealing the tax on medical devices.
Washington Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the chairwoman of the House Republican Conference, attempted Saturday to move the debate to the next budget-battle deadline – Oct. 17 – when Congress must increase the government’s borrowing limit or risk defaulting on its debt. Americans oppose raising the debt limit by a 2 – 1 margin, making it a more attractive fight to many Republicans.
Republican want spending cuts as part of the deal, but the White House has said it will not engage in “extortion” negotiations. Rogers said:
The president is now demanding that we increase the debt limit without engaging in any kind of bipartisan discussions about addressing our spending problem. By an overwhelming margin, Americans believe the debt-ceiling increase should be coupled with solutions that help solve our debt and grown our economy. … Coupling an increase in the debt limit with efforts to rein in spending makes common sense, so much so that it’s been used from presidents from both parties.
If lawmakers miss the Monday deadline, hundreds of thousands of nonessential federal workers would have to stay home on Tuesday, though critical services – despite Democratic scare tactics – such as patrolling the borders, inspecting meat and controlling air traffic would assuredly continue. Social Security benefits would be sent and the Medicare and Medicaid health care programs for the elderly and poor would continue to pay doctors and hospitals, as always
