The Republican-dominated House of Representatives has approved a bipartisan Senate deal to avert the "fiscal cliff" and preserve Bush era tax cuts for all Americans making less than $400,000 per year. The compromise is now on it's way to President Obama for his signature.
House Republicans agreed to the up-or-down vote Tuesday evening, despite earlier talk of trying to amend the Senate bill with more spending cuts before taking a vote. The bill delays for two months tough decisions about automatic spending cuts that were set to kick in Wednesday.
The deal does little to address the nation's long-term debt woes, however, and does not entirely solve the problem of the "fiscal cliff."
Indeed, the last-minute compromise -- far short from a so-called grand bargain on deficit reduction -- sets up a new showdown on the same spending cuts in two months amplified by a brewing fight on how to raise the debt ceiling beyond $16.4 trillion. That new fiscal battle has the potential to eclipse the "fiscal cliff" in short order.
A majority of the Republicans in the House voted against the bill. About twice as many Democrats voted in favor of the deal compared to Republicans. 151 Republicans joined 16 Democrats to vote against the deal, while 172 Democrats carried the vote along with 85 Republicans.
The Senate passed the same bill by an 89-8 vote in the wee hours of New Year's Day. If House Republicans had tweaked the legislation, there would have been no clear path for its return to the Senate before a new Congress is sworn in Thursday.
The vote split Republican leaders in the House. House Speaker John Boehner voted yes. And so did the GOP's 2012 Vice Presidential candidate Paul Ryan. But Eric Cantor, the number two Republican, voted no. And it was his opposition that had made passage of the bill seem unlikely earlier in the day.
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Before deciding on the up-or-down vote in the House, GOP leaders had emerged from a morning conference meeting disenchanted by the legislative package devised by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Mo., and Vice President Biden early this morning, with several insisting they could not vote on it as it stood.
"I do not support the bill," House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., said as he left the meeting. "We're looking for the best path forward. No decisions have been made yet."
House Speaker John Boehner refused to comment on the meeting, but his spokesman said, "the lack of spending cuts in the Senate bill was a universal concern amongst members in today's meeting."
"Conversations with members will continue throughout the afternoon on the path forward," Brendan Buck said in a statement.
As lawmakers wrestled with the legislation, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that the bill's added spending combined with the cost of extending tax cuts for those making under $400,000 would actually add $3.9 trillion to the deficit over the next 10 years. The Joint Committee on Taxation reached a similar conclusion.
The impasse once again raised the specter of sweeping tax hikes on all Americans and deep spending cuts' taking effect later this week.
"This is all about time, and it's about time that we brought this to the floor," House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said after emerging from a meeting with Democrats.
"It was a bill that was passed in the U.S. Senate 89-8. Tell me when you've had that on a measure as controversial as this?" she said of the overwhelming vote.
Pelosi could not say, however, whether the measure had the backing of most House Democrats.
"Our members are making their decisions now," she said.
Biden, who brokered the deal with McConnell, joined Democrats for a midday meeting on Capitol Hill seeking to shore up support for the plan.
While Congress technically missed the midnight Dec. 31 deadline to avert the so-called cliff, both sides have expressed eagerness to enact a post-facto fix before Americans go back to work and the stock market opens Wednesday.
"This may take a little while but, honestly, I would argue we should vote on it today," said Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla., who sits on the Budget Committee, early Tuesday. "We know the essential details and I think putting this thing to bed before the markets is important.
"We ought to take this deal right now and we'll live to fight another day, and it is coming very soon on the spending front."
House Approves 'Fiscal Cliff' Deal
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House Approves 'Fiscal Cliff' Deal
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