Texarkana Gazette

House passes bipartisan budget bill with Trump support

- By Andrew Taylor

WASHINGTON—Observing a rare cease-fire in their battles with President Donald Trump, the Democratic-controlled House on Thursday easily passed bipartisan debt and budget legislatio­n to permit the Treasury to issue bonds to pay the government’s bills and lock in place recent budget gains for both the Pentagon and domestic agencies.

The measure, passed by a 284-149 vote, would head off another politicall­y dangerous government shutdown and add a measure of stability to action this fall on a $1.37 trillion slate of annual appropriat­ions bills. The Senate is scheduled to approve the bill next week.

The hard-won agreement between the administra­tion and Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi lifts the limit on the government’s $22 trillion debt for two years and averts the risk of the Pentagon and domestic agencies from being hit with $125 billion in automatic spending cuts that are all that’s left of a failed 2011 budget pact. It is a welcome detente for lawmakers seeking to avoid political and economic turmoil over the possibilit­y of a government shutdown or first federal default.

Trump took to Twitter to give the legislatio­n his strongest endorsemen­t yet: “House Republican­s should support the TWO YEAR BUDGET AGREEMENT which greatly helps our Military and our Vets.” He added in a note of encouragem­ent, “I am totally with you!”

Democrats rallied behind the legislatio­n, which protects domestic programs some of them have fought to protect for decades through extended stretches of GOP control of Congress. Pelosi held the vote open to make sure the tally of Democratic votes topped the 218 required to pass the measure with Democratic support alone, a demonstrat­ion of strength.

House GOP conservati­ves, many of whom won election promising to tackle entrenched federal deficits, generally recoiled from it.

Many supporters, including the GOP leadership team, praised the bill as an imperfect but necessary result of Washington’s current divided balance of power and an already overheated presidenti­al campaign.

“The alternativ­es are very, very bad,” said Rep. Kay Granger of Texas, the top Republican on the Appropriat­ions Committee.

But it contains no new steps to curb spending elsewhere in the budget, rankling conservati­ves and lawmakers alarmed by the return of $1 trillion-plus budget deficits.

“Republican­s who go along with this budget deal will lose all credibilit­y on spending. This is budget deal is ludicrous,” said Jason Pye of the FreedomWor­ks conservati­ve advocacy group. “The GOP has been misleading the American public on spending for years now. Yeah, they talk a great game on the campaign trail. But when it’s crunch time, they fold.”

Trump’s active support for the measure did little to stem the tide of GOP defections. Democrats backed the bill by a 13-1 margin while less than one in three Republican­s supported the Trump-backed measure.

GOP conservati­ves, who comprise Trump’s strongest base of support in Washington, weren’t critical of Trump for agreeing to the deal, even after Pelosi forced GOP negotiator­s to drop ambitious cuts to try to defray the bill’s impact on the debt. Few opposition Republican­s issued statements on the bill that might put them on record opposing Trump.

“You just have to understand that you lost in the negotiatio­ns and express your opinion, vote your conscience and go on,” said Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C. “It’s different when you’re in the minority.”

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United States