Republican leaders on Tuesday night agreed to allow a vote on aid for the Flint, Michigan, water crisis in a water resources bill, potentially setting up Congressional leaders to agree on a temporary funding bill to keep the government open until December.
The House Rules Committee had initially blocked an amendment on Flint aide to the Water Resources Development Act, but GOP leaders agreed to add the amendment providing $170 million in aid for Flint, according to The Hill.
The agreement came after the Senate failed to advance a short-term spending measure on Tuesday when Democrats balked at the legislation’s lack of funding for Flint. The continuing resolution’s failure raised concerns that Congress would not be able to reach an agreement on a spending measure in time to avoid a government shutdown.
The agreement to provide funding for Flint was part of negotiations between House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI), house Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), according to Politico. The vote on Flint aid could lead to an agreement on the broader government funding measure, but it’s not clear that including aid for Flint in the water bill will be enough for Democrats.
Aid to Flint is a gimmie, a given and is not a bargaining chip.
The discussion does not start or stop there.
Flint is special, yes, but so is every town in America and every citizen.
If we have the ‘right’ to carry military assault weapons designed hundreds of years after the, Bill of Rights, was even a concept, then we damned for sure have the right to breathe fresh air and drink clean water. These are rights that are right, the machine guns and shit, not so much.
Did Donald Trump give all his Minions-branded Play Doh to Louisiana already? Maybe he could be photographed “helping” again.
Pelosi is cutting deals with McConnell. Paul Ryan and Harry Reid must feel neglected.
Maybe she’s doing him a favor. I’ve had some issues with Pelosi, but she deserves some sort of medal for having to sit down in a room with Ryan and McConnell for any length of time. That’s gotta be taxing.
Neglected? She is saving Ryan’s ass. Sadly, its something she has learned she has to do with every republican Speaker. And she isn’t getting much in return, either.
What this piece is leaving out is, Ryan was unable to round up the Crazy Caucus to get enough votes for a CR (and yes, its merely a CR until 12/9 because Ryan broke the budget agreement from 2015 to pass a series of appropriations bills throughout the year), so he had to go hat in hand to Pelosi.
The really disconcerting part here is…the money isn’t actually being agreed to. Ryan is merely giving her an “ironclad” promise that they will put the money in when they take up the actual appropriations bill to replace the CR.
Now…given that they had an actual written budget framework, signed by both sides, to deal with the appropriations process, and Ryan promptly broke every single promise in it and refused/was unable to pass any of the required packages…who really thinks his “ironclad” promise on budgetary matters is worth anything?
Indeed, the notion of passing an actual budget to replace the CR AFTER a Hillary victory with a lame duck Congress is laughably absurd. Kicking off a government shutdown as her welcome present is going to be the top priority of every republican in Congress, particularly in the Freedom Caucus who are the guys forcing Ryan to reach out to Pelosi in the first place for this CR.