http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/12/11/house-gop-leaders-delay-vote-on-spending-bill-scramble-for-support/House narrowly approves spending bill, legislation heads to Senate
Published December 11, 2014FoxNews.com
DEVELOPING:
The House narrowly approved a vital spending bill Thursday night despite deep misgivings among liberals and conservatives alike, sending the measure to the Senate as a funding deadline looms.
The bill passed on a 219-206 vote, following an intense lobbying effort by House Republican leaders and the Obama White House.
Current government funding technically runs out at midnight Thursday, and lawmakers still may have to pass a stopgap measure to buy time as the Senate debates the main $1.1 trillion spending package.
Original Story
House Republican leaders and the Obama White House were struggling to secure the votes for a $1.1 trillion spending bill ahead of a midnight deadline Thursday, after forming an unlikely alliance in a bid to avert a partial government shutdown.
As the deadline neared, President Obama and Vice President Biden were calling House Democrats and appealing for their support. White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough also met on the Hill with the Democratic caucus, but sources inside the meeting told Fox News his presentation did little to persuade lawmakers.
Meanwhile, House GOP leaders were trying to sway conservative members who, for different reasons, were opposed to the package.
It remains unclear whether the push can produce a bipartisan majority to approve the package. Despite the difficulties, House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy insisted they would "get it done."
Earlier in the day, the bill narrowly cleared an important procedural hurdle, on a 214-212 test vote. But the tight vote, which almost failed, exposed serious problems -- all Democrats voted against it, while 16 Republicans defected.
GOP leaders then delayed a final vote, signaling they did not yet have enough support lined up to pass the legislation. A spending bill of some kind is needed to avert a government shutdown after the midnight deadline. A senior House GOP source told Fox News it is "very close."
Many conservatives continue to oppose the bill because it does not attack Obama's immigration executive actions, while liberal Democrats are angry over provisions dealing with campaign spending and financial regulation.
House Speaker John Boehner can only afford to lose 17 Republicans before needing Democrats, and it was unclear whether enough might support the bill.
Amid the drama, lawmakers could still avert a partial shutdown. Current government funding technically runs out at midnight Thursday, but Fox News is told the House is looking to quickly approve a two-day resolution to fund the government through Saturday at midnight, and buy time.
A spokeswoman with the White House budget office said they "believe that time remains for Congress to pass full-year appropriations for FY 2015, and prevent a government shutdown." Nevertheless, she said agencies are preparing "for all contingencies, including a potential lapse in funding" out of an "abundance of caution."
White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said earlier that Obama supports the bill and would sign it -- despite having reservations about certain provisions.
But House Democrats were flexing their muscle, pushing back not only against GOP leaders but Obama's lobbying effort.
In a rare public rebuke of the president, Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said she was "enormously disappointed" he had decided to embrace the bill, which she described as an attempt at legislative blackmail by House Republicans.
Pelosi, D-Calif., sent an email note to colleagues saying it is "clear" Republicans don't have the votes. She claimed this increases Democrats' "leverage" to make demands -- namely, to remove two provisions her party doesn't like. They are: a provision rolling back one of the regulations imposed on the financial industry in the wake of the economic collapse of 2008, and one that permits wealthy contributors to increase the size of their donations to political parties for national conventions, election recounts or the construction of a headquarters building.
"They don't have the votes," Assistant Democratic Leader Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., told Fox News, referring to Republicans.
Even if the House does pass the $1.1 trillion spending bill, its fate in the Senate remains unclear.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., now a member of leadership, is going to the mat to convince Democrats not to support the spending bill in an effort to preserve the financial regulatory policy known as Dodd-Frank. Debate in the Senate on the main spending bill could easily last several more days, further underscoring the need for a stopgap spending bill.
Still, there are options.
Boehner could bring up a measure to fund the federal government for the entire fiscal year at the current spending level, doing nothing about immigration. (The current plan would fund the government through September 2015, but immigration services only through late February, teeing up a battle over immigration for early 2015).
If Boehner moves to extend all funding for a year, he'd have to rely on lots of Democrats, and would face an internal firestorm from conservatives -- though it would avert a government shutdown.
No one has actively spoken about this scenario. One senior aide told Fox News, "We're a long way from that happening."
The second theoretical option would be for Boehner to put a short-term spending bill on the floor which restricts money for immigration services. That would pass the House, but it would probably die in the Senate and face a veto threat by Obama -- though this option is not under active consideration at the moment.
Fox News' Chad Pergram and Ed Henry and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
