Pelosi: GOP On Their Own In Omnibus Vote

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) warned GOP leaders in the House that if they plan to vote on a $1 trillion omnibus bill this week, they can do it without the support of House Democrats.

“I hope they have the votes for it, because if they don’t’, they won’t be getting any cooperation from us,” Pelosi told reporters at her weekly press briefing. 

House Republican leaders are expected to bring the omnibus to the floor without Democratic support. This could be an uphill battle for House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) who has had trouble winning the votes of some rank-and-file Republicans on a number of occasions throughout the year. 

With the end of the week fast approaching, the threat of yet another government shutdown looms over Congress. One option that would essentially serve as Plan B for Congress is the potential for passing a short-term continuing resolution that would keep the government funded into next week, giving the legislative body more time to work out their differences with the current payroll package.

Pelosi said that a shutdown was, in fact, possible but that there were many avenues available that would work to avoid it. 

“It’s only a decision that Republicans have to make that they want to avoid a shutdown by coming to the table and coming to their sense about what is fair to get the job done, to get results for the American people, instead of creating a crisis,” Pelosi said. 

Pelosi stood by the White House’s threat to veto the bill, saying “our caucus supports the president if he wants to veto the bill because of some of the provisions that are in there. We won’t be voting for a bill that has them.”

“It’s like someone saying to her fiancé, ‘Yes, I’ll finally marry you, but I can only do that on Feb. 30,’” Pelosi said. “That day is never coming, nor is the day coming when the president will sign the that Republicans passed.” 

Pelosi Defends Democrats' Rejection Of CR Bill

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) defended Democrats’ decision to reject the lower chamber’s CR bill during her weekly press briefing Thursday.

“We should not go down a different path now than we have done on natural disaster assistance,” Pelosi remarked. “That’s why we fought so hard about what the Republicans put forth. On top of that, we didn’t like the offset because it was a jobs killer.”

The House Republicans’ continuing resolution (CR) included $3.65 billion in funding  for disaster relief and was partially offset by a $1.5 billion cut to a Department of Energy advanced manufacturing loan program.

The bill was rejected by a House vote of 195-230 with only six Democrats choosing to support it. 48 conservative Republicans ultimately voted against it based on the belief that it did not cut enough spending.

“Assistance in the time of a natural disaster should not be a controversial issue,” Pelosi continued. “It hasn’t been before.”

While the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has a mere $215 million left in its disaster relief fund. Pelosi argued that the bill was not about paying for disaster.

“It was clear to us that this wasn’t about paying for the disaster but destroying an initiative that is jobs creating,” Pelosi charged.

Republican leaders are busy working towards a new resolution to fund FEMA and prevent a government shut down at the end of the fiscal year on September 30.

Click here to see photos from today’s briefing

GOP Budget Plans Ruffle Democrats

By Anna Cameron

Prior to a meeting of the House Democratic Caucus Tuesday, Democrats criticized a pair of GOP budget plans — one short-term, one long-term — that have received significant attention today.

“What is happening…is you see Republican Governors using the fragile economic situation and the deficit as a pretext for going after working Americans,” said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.). “What we are seeing here in Washington D.C. is exactly the same thing.”

According to Van Hollen, the Republicans’ 2012 budget proposal, drafted primarily by House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), is a reflection of the “same rigid, ideological agenda,” which extends further tax breaks to the wealthy, cuts funding to education, research, and infrastructure, and dismantles the Medicare guarantee to senior citizens.

“Our budget reflects our values, and those values do not include balancing a budget on the backs of the disabled veterans, on the backs of students trying to obtain their college education, [and] on the backs of the elderly seeking their medical care,” said House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.) of the difference between Democrats and Republicans.

“This war on workers has to stop,” urged House Democratic Caucus Vice Chair Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-Calif.). “Unfortunately, it looks like…it will now add a second front: a war on seniors.”

As a potential government shutdown looms, the White House has rejected the latest Republican stopgap measure, which would cut $12 billion while keeping the government running for another week.

“Obviously, we feel its in everyone’s interests to keep government open and performing,” said Larson when asked about the latest GOP-authored CR. “But we wont continue to see death by 1000 slashes as we go through this charade of puppetry orchestrated by the Tea Party as to whether or not there’s going to be any kind of budget resolution this year, or [if] we just continue these week-to-week sojourns.”