House Republicans are pointing fingers at one another the day after a vote on the Patriot Act failed on their watch, and they’re already bracing for another embarrassing floor vote Wednesday. GOP aides predict that the House will fail to pass a bill Wednesday that would retrieve money already paid to the United Nations — a rejection which would bring their legislative losses to three bills this week. The U.N. bill would return $179 million that was paid into the U.N. tax equalization fund.
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s (R-Va.) signature budget slashing initiative, known as YouCut, will be brought up Wednesday under suspension of House rules that require two-thirds vote for passage. Several GOP sources said Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.), at the urging of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, is lobbying against the bill.
On Tuesday Republicans also yanked a trade bill from the floor hours before it was supposed to come up, just hours before the Patriot Act debacle.
But even with a 65-seat majority, Republicans are still blaming Democrats for their troubles. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), who led his party to a historic triumph in the mid-term elections, said his control of the House is new.
“We’ve been in the majority four weeks,” Boehner told reporters Wednesday morning. “We’re not going to be perfect every day. If the Democrats who voted for these same provisions last year would’ve voted for them this year it would’ve passed. But we’re going to get these extensions of the Patriot Act enacted because it’s important to the safety and security of the American people.”
Republicans say that Democrats are overplaying their hand, by registering ‘no’ votes on provisions that can be used against them later.
When asked why Republicans put the bill on the floor under a procedural motion that required two-thirds majority to pass, Boehner didn’t have an answer.
“It was,” Boehner said, when asked why it was placed on the suspension calendar.
