Hopes were high last week that the Senate was just going to buckle down and pass a budget deal to send to the House that would keep the government's doors open after September 30. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell even scheduled a cloture vote for yesterday afternoon to get the procedural ball rolling. Then, without much explanation, they pulled that vote and rescheduled it for Tuesday afternoon.
The good news is that the big hold-up to date, Zika funding, has apparently been resolved without the ban on funding to Planned Parenthood. So what's going on? Apparently a reluctance on the part of Senate Republicans to budget any money for helping people in Flint, Michigan.
In a brief interview Monday morning, Reid said “no” when asked whether there would be a deal on government funding later in the day.
“Close is relative,” Reid responded when asked whether an agreement was within reach.
For instance, funding for the water crisis in Flint, Michigan, continues to be in the mix. Democrats on both ends of the Capitol have lobbied for Flint funds to be included in the government spending package, in particular the aid package included in a Senate water resources bill.
But Republicans have similar demands: additional funding for flood-stricken Louisiana in the short-term spending measure. Both issues remained unresolved as of Monday evening, although senior Senate Democrats suggested they wouldn’t accept flood aid without also getting money for Flint. Congressional leaders are also still hashing out how to pay for the Zika funding package.
"Louisiana is not resolved," said Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer, "because [Republicans] want to do Louisiana, we want to do Flint. They don't want to do Flint." Read that again. They don't want to help Flint, despite the fact that last week they passed a water bill that would do just that. The thing is, though, the House hasn't acted on that water bill, and isn't likely to. So the Flint aid they supported just last week wasn't real, they knew the House could kill it. Now, with an opportunity to actually help the city—and all those children poisoned by lead in their drinking water—they're balking.
This is no way to run a government.
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