Democrats don’t like a House plan to pass a two-part government funding bill, but they are willing to vote for it.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., green-lighted the deal Tuesday afternoon, telling reporters he isn’t in favor of passing a long-term funding measure for most of the government, but only a three-month provision to fund the Department of Homeland Security.
“It’s kind of unfortunate that they are talking about not doing Homeland Security,” Reid told reporters on Tuesday. “But that’s the way it is.”
Democrats used terms like “regrettable,” “dangerous” and “irresponsible” to describe a GOP tactic to pass a fiscal 2015 spending measure before a Dec. 11 deadline.
But they are all but pledging to vote for the dual plan, which the GOP devised in an effort to placate its conservative faction, who are angry over President Obama’s executive action to stem deportations.
“It would be a great accomplishment if we could get a bill over here that would fund all the appropriations [legislation] except for one,” Reid said Tuesday.
Democrats say they have no reason to vote against the plan because it does not strip funding for any federal programs or otherwise hobble Obama’s authority.
“I think we may well support it,” House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, D-Md., told the Washington Examiner. “But it makes no sense.”
Republican leaders nixed a conservative proposal to defund parts of the Homeland Security Department that would administer Obama’s deportation directive.
Instead, they’ll vote on a separate measure, authored by Ted Yoho, R-Fla., that would declare the president does not have the authority to implement his plan to halt deportations.
Reid said he won’t take up Yoho’s measure.
The House bill would fund most of the government until the end of fiscal 2015, which ends next year on Sept. 30.
The second bill would pay for the Homeland Security Department until the end of March. Republican majorities in the House and Senate would then have more power to pass legislation that defunds the deportation directive.
