The almost $1 trillion measure passed on a 296-121 vote in the House on Friday and now goes to the Senate, where approval is also expected -- averting a partial government shutdown as a deadline loomed at midnight Friday.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, said Friday that under a White House ruling, "if one house passes a spending bill ... and there's a presumption it will pass in the other body, the time is extended for 24 hours."
A one-day continuing resolution was passed by the Senate on Friday and signed by President Barack Obama to keep the government funded through Saturday's expected vote.
Also on Friday, the House headed out for its holiday recess, as scheduled, after passing the appropriations bill. But Speaker John Boehner told reporters that members could be called back to Washington if the Senate passes a separate measure extending the payroll tax cut.
"The members will go home, and if there's a need to come back to finish our work, we will do so," said Boehner, R-Ohio.
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Virginia, notified members they would get a 24-hour notice of any pending votes if the Senate sends back a payroll tax-cut measure.
On Friday night, Senate negotiators were unable to reach agreement on a comprehensive payroll tax-cut plan and instead proposed a two-month extension. It was unclear if the plan would get eventual approval from the full Senate. A vote on the proposed deal could come as early as Saturday.
Officials said that in private talks, the two sides had hoped to reach agreement on the full one-year extension of the payroll tax cut and unemployment benefits that Obama had made the centerpiece of the jobs program he submitted to Congress last fall.
Those efforts failed when the two sides could not agree on enough offsetting cuts to blunt the measure's impact on the debt.
The failure tees up the issue again for early next year, but it won't get any easier to agree on spending cuts.
"We'll be back discussing the same issues in a couple of months, but from our point of view, we think the keystone pipeline is a very important job-creating measure in the private sector that doesn't cost the government a penny," said Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader.
There was no immediate reaction from House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio. Neither he nor his aides participated in the negotiations, although McConnell said he was optimistic about the measure's chances for final approval. The payroll tax cut is unpopular in GOP ranks and another vote in two month could present a headache for GOP leaders.
The State Department, in an analysis released this summer, said the project would create up to 6,000 jobs during construction, while developer TransCanada put the total at 20,000 in direct employment.
The 1,700-mile pipeline would carry oil from western Canada to Texas Gulf Coast refineries, passing through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma.
The spending bill would lock in cuts that conservative Republicans won from the White House and Democrats earlier in the year.
Republicans also won their fight to block new federal regulations for light bulb energy efficiency, coal dust in mines and clean water permits for construction of timber roads.
The White House turned back GOP attempts to block limits on greenhouse gases, mountaintop removal mining and hazardous emissions from utility plants, industrial boilers and cement kilns.
Associated Press writers David Espo, Alan Fram, Donna Cassata and Jim Kuhnhenn contributed to this report.
No comments:
Post a Comment