CQ TODAY PRINT EDITION
– CONGRESSIONAL AFFAIRS
Sept. 29, 2008 – 10:01 p.m.
With Members’ Minds Made Up, Even Leaders’ Cajoling Couldn’t Win Bailout
By Alan K. Ota, CQ Staff
With Rosh Hashana approaching at sundown, House leaders were stuck Monday afternoon between their promise to get West Coast lawmakers home for the holiday and their pledge to the White House to push the financial recovery bill through to the Senate.
The vote clock was ticking, and it appeared there was not enough time to do the cajoling, lobbying and arm-twisting that usually comes with persuading undecided lawmakers in an important vote.
The question is whether in this case, any amount of time would have made a big difference.
When voting began at 1:28 p.m., rumors were rampant on the floor that whip counts had shown insufficient support to pass the bailout, even though both parties had predicted victory for much of the morning.
And sure enough, as the numbers on the tally board changed, slowly but steadily, those predictions turned out to be true. Unlike other close and high-profile votes of the recent past, there seemed to be a resoluteness to this one. Few votes changed from yea to nay, or vice versa. Only one member, Jerry Weller , R-Ill., who is not running for re-election, did not vote at all.
Although the outcome came as a surprise to some, leaders of both parties had said for weeks that they were trying to achieve a difficult balance between the competing demands of Wall Street, voters and their caucuses.
While Wall Street seemed to be mollified as details of the compromise came together, leaders of both parties found it much tougher to forge consensus among their own rank-and-file members. And whatever they did seemed to bring little change in the stream of negative telephone calls and e-mail messages from constituents angry about the size and scope of the package.
Over the weekend Sen. John McCain , R‑Ariz., had called between 50 and 60 House Republicans, according to Rep. Mark Steven Kirk , R-Ill., a McCain adviser. “He thinks there is a real danger of a second Depression. He does not want Americans and their children to go through that,” Kirk said.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce — a lobbying voice usually heeded by the GOP — warned that the vote would be counted in its annual scorecard.
President Bush worked the phones into Monday morning, and his budget director, Jim Nussle, kept working during the vote, chatting with former colleagues in the rear of the House chamber.
Joe L. Barton , R-Texas, got a call from Bush, as well as calls from Minority Leader John A. Boehner of Ohio, Minority Whip Roy Blunt of Missouri and “a couple of hundred” calls from constituents.
He voted no.
Fifty-Plus-One Agreement
With Members’ Minds Made Up, Even Leaders’ Cajoling Couldn’t Win Bailout
In the run-up to the vote, House Democrats put Republicans on notice that they would treat the bill like a congressional pay raise — an unpopular, must-pass bill that neither party should have to carry alone.
“The agreement was that we would each try to get 50 percent plus one,” said David R. Obey , D-Wis. “The Democrats delivered 60 percent of our caucus for this package; they delivered 33 percent.”
As it played out on the floor, aides on both sides questioned whether the opposition was lowballing estimates. “It’s a game of chicken,” a House Democratic aide said.
And it was soon clear that the bill was in deep trouble.
Sue Myrick , R-N.C., whose district includes two of the biggest potential beneficiaries — Bank of America Corp. and Wachovia Corp. — said she had heard from many constituents and decided to vote no.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi , D-Calif., seemed confident she could persuade some more lawmakers on the floor.
She had already rounded up some Blue Dog Coalition votes by standing with the group in a showdown with the Senate and insisting on revenue-raising measures to pay for an unrelated package of tax-cut extensions.
And as the debate proceeded toward a conclusion, Pelosi took a gamble by making a floor speech designed for her party’s liberal base. She said that the bailout would need to make up for years of “budget recklessness” by the GOP. “Before long we will have a new Congress, a new president . . . and we will be able to take our country in a new direction,” she said.
The speech was similar to other comments she had made on television news programs in recent weeks, and only 10 or so Republicans were on the floor to listen.
But Republicans were annoyed.
Blunt said Pelosi’s remarks resulted in a swing of as many as 12 GOP votes.
“It caused a lot of members that we thought we could get to go south,” Boehner said.
Democrats called that a convenient excuse and criticized Boehner for not being able to stand up to the extreme right flank of his caucus.
With Members’ Minds Made Up, Even Leaders’ Cajoling Couldn’t Win Bailout
“This demonstrates that Boehner, [Rep. Eric Cantor , R-Va.], Bush, McCain — the whole passel — lost total control of their party,” Obey said. “You’ve got Cantor [the chief deputy Republican whip] and Boehner and the half a dozen other would-be leaders each trying to outmaneuver each other by showing who can belly-bump the hardest.”
Whispered insights from behind the scenes seemed to back that up. One member of the Republican Study Committee (RSC), a fiscally conservative faction, said rank-and-file Republicans were reluctant to stand with Bush and Boehner against the RSC. “There’s a small group of RSC members who are intent on taking control, and people are scared of [them],” the House conservative said. “They’re vicious.”
Still, leaders worked to try to soften positions that just wouldn’t budge.
On the right, Jeb Hensarling of Texas, the RSC chairman, portrayed the bailout as a “step down the slippery slope to socialism.” On the left, liberals said the bill simply did not do enough for low-income families. “I live in one of the poorest districts in the country,” said Homeland Security Chairman Bennie Thompson , D-Miss. “It just doesn’t have much for my people.”
In the final moments before the leaders gave up for the day, Boehner talked to John Sullivan , R-Okla, who then changed his vote from no to yes. A few minutes later, Sullivan switched back to no.
Pelosi kneeled on a leather chair, pressing Thompson and several other members of the Congressional Black Caucus to change their votes. But no one moved.
Pelosi finally walked toward the well and motioned to Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer , D-Md., with a downward sweep of her right hand to signal that she was resigned to the bill’s fate.
She turned and walked off the floor about 2:03 p.m.
Hoyer and Rahm Emanuel , D-Ill., talked briefly with Blunt, and moments later, the vote was gaveled to a close.
Molly K. Hooper, David Clarke, Bart Jansen, Liriel Higa, Joseph J. Schatz, Catharine Richert, Kathleen Hunter and Colby Itkowitz contributed to this story.
Comments
My wife was able to watch a good part of the floor action at the US House of Representatives as they voted for the bailout yesterday. She told me that Pelosi, Hoyer and the rest of the Democratic leaders worked the floor hard. While they were cajoling the rank and file to support the Treasury Department's rescue plan, they kept looking up at the vote tally board. When it became apparent that the measure was going to fail, the Democratic leaders retreated and let the thing sink. The failure in courage and conviction on this bill came from GOP whip Blount's double-crossing his leader John Boehner and from the utter cowardice of the GOP House rank and file. These people per usual failed to take a stand benefitting the American people preferring instead to pander to the extremist wing of their party. The suffering of pensioners and others dependent on the value of 401Ks and other shared stock equities is the direct result of the cowardice of the GOP house caucus.
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