A stop-gap spending bill that would fund the government at current levels through Dec. 11 cleared a key procedural hurdle in the Senate Monday on a 77 to 19 vote — and the upper chamber is expected to pass the measure as soon as Tuesday.
If all goes according to the plan hatched by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnnell (R-Ky.) and Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), the House could clear the stop-gap funding bill on Wednesday, averting a shutdown with hours to spare before the Oct. 1 deadline.
The only potential speed bump standing in the way of quick consideration of the bill in the Senate was Sen. Ted Cruz, but Senate leaders took procedural steps to limit the Texas Republican’s options.
Cruz railed against Planned Parenthood and the Iran deal on the Senate floor following the vote Monday, saying he believes the “votes are cooked” in Congress. He said a spending bill without any policy restrictions is “essentially a blank check” to Obama.
“That’s not very clean to me – it actually sounds like a very dirty funding bill,” Cruz said.
He and other conservatives for weeks have been calling on GOP leaders to confront Obama over abortion policies by using the spending bill needed to avert a shutdown this week to cut off funding for Planned Parenthood.
But they are now focusing their attention on December.
This turnabout occurred following House Speaker John Boehner’s (R-Ohio) announcement on Friday that he will resign at the end of October rather than continue to battle with the most conservative members over how aggressively to confront Obama over issues such as spending, abortion and the Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare.
Conservatives now view December as the better time to challenge the president because there will be a new House GOP leadership team in place that they will pressure to take a tougher approach.
Republican leaders are moving ahead with a separate strategy for confronting Obama over Planned Parenthood and Obamacare by using the fast-track budget reconciliation process, under which bills can not be filibustered in the Senate. This would allow Republicans to pick a veto fight with the president.
Three House committees on Monday announced plans to begin the process of attempting to repeal parts of the president’s health care law and defund Planned Parenthood through the reconciliation process.
The House Ways and Means, Energy and Commerce and Education and the Workforce Committees will markup bills this week to start the reconciliation process. Once those bills pass the House, the Senate is expected consider them as well.
It is not clear that the reconciliation strategy will satisfy Cruz and other conservatives and cause them to abandon their argument that a government spending bill is the best way to challenge the president.
“This fight certainly isn’t over. We’ve got to remember that this is a short-term funding, a sort of patch, so we’ll likely be back here in December,” the Cruz ally said. “December will be a similar fight. It’s a new bite at the apple.”
Many GOP senators and moderate Republicans in the House are wary of conservatives attempts to force a government shutdown over Planned Parenthood or other differences with Obama. They worry Republicans will be blamed for a shutdown, hurting the part in advance of the 2016 elections.
For instance, Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) wrote to Cruz earlier this month asking him to detail his political strategy for defunding Planned Parenthood.
Ayotte wrote that she voted for a bill to redirect funds from Planned Parenthood to other women’s health providers but that legislation didn’t have enough votes pass, let alone enough votes to reverse a veto from Obama. She asked him to explain how he planned to overcome those hurdles.
“During the last government shutdown, I repeatedly asked you what your strategy for success was when we did not have the votes to achieve the goal of defunding Obamacare, but I did not receive an answer,” she wrote. “I am again asking this question and would appreciate you sharing your strategy for success with all of us before any damaging government shutdown becomes imminent.”
Similar tensions could arise again in December if threats of a shutdown fight resurface.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2015/09/28/senate-to-vote-on-plan-to-avert-shutdown/
