Here’s the roll call for Boehner’s stupid bill to do a bunch of radical things in exchange for extending the payroll tax holiday and unemployment insurance benefits. Ten Democrats, most of them reliably terrible, voted for this monstrosity. Fourteen Republicans voted against it, most, if not all, because it wasn’t radical enough. The Speaker wanted 240 Republican votes, but got only 224.
Members approved the bill in a 234-193 vote in which 224 Republicans supported it — short of House Speaker John Boehner’s (R-Ohio) goal of getting 240 GOP votes, which he said would give the House a “strong hand” in negotiations with Senate Democrats.
The White House didn’t wait long to issue their response:
Statement by the Press Secretary on Tonight’s House Vote on the GOP Payroll Tax Cut Plan
This Congress needs to do its job and stop the tax hike that’s scheduled to affect 160 million Americans in 18 days. This is not a time for Washington Republicans to score political points against the President. It’s not a time to refight old ideological battles. And it’s not a time to break last summer’s bipartisan agreement and hurt the middle class by cutting things like education, clean energy, and veterans’ programs without asking the wealthiest Americans to pay their fair share.
This is a time to help the middle class and all those trying to reach it by extending a tax cut worth $1,000 for the average family. The President has been very clear: Congress should not finish their business before finishing the business of the American people. They cannot go on vacation before agreeing to prevent a tax hike on 160 million Americans and extending unemployment insurance. That is simply inexcusable in this economy. It is our expectation that in the eleventh hour Congressional Republicans and Democrats will come to an agreement to protect the middle class and finish their budget work for the year.
As far as the White House is concerned, it’s like the House didn’t pass anything at all. They didn’t even react to the stupid Keystone XL gambit. Boehner went to a lot of effort to pass this stupid bill in the hope that he would gain some leverage, but he fell far short of his goal and he now has even less time to wrap his business.
The vote sets up the prospect of negotiations with the White House and Senate over how to deal with the bill, as the Senate is not expected to approve it. The House all year has moved to pass critical legislation in order to boost its chances of success in negations with Democrats in the Senate and the White House, and appeared to be following that game plan with today’s vote.
Harry Reid slowed down the negotiations over the separate appropriations omnibus bill, preventing Boehner from passing his version of it and then just splitting town and forcing the Senate to take it or leave it.
As for forcing Congress to spend Christmas in Washington, Article II, Section III of the Constitution says this (emphasis mine):
Section 3 – State of the Union, Convening Congress
He [the president] shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper; he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers; he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the Officers of the United States.
There’s a whole lot of dysfunction on display in the Capitol. And not much holiday cheer.
