As CQ reported yesterday, just three months after taking the majority, Democrats are going to amend the very budget rules they created to promote fiscal responsibility. The Democrats say they are amending these rules to keep Republicans from being able to amend bills, I think they are doing it to spend more money. Either way, Americans are getting a raw deal.
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HR 1433) was withdrawn from floor debate to avoid a vote on a Republican motion regarding gun laws….Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer said Tuesday that during the upcoming two-week recess he will craft changes in the pay-as-you-go spending rules adopted in January (H Res 6) so that the GOP can no longer blindside the majority with broad and politically loaded motions to redraft legislation….
The GOP has made 19 motions to recommit bills, and has been successful six times. They might have added a seventh to that string, but a bill providing for a vote in the House for the District of Columbia (
Democratic leaders said the bill will return to the floor in April, after new House rules have been adopted….
"The majority should try to figure out how to debate bills rather than further minimize procedures available to the minority," said Minority Whip Roy Blunt, R-Mo.…
"No matter how they do it, they’d be eroding at least decades of germaneness precedents and rolling back the minority’s ability to offer motions to recommit," one Republican aide said.