I have not closely covered the journey of the GOP's "rescission" package making it's way through Congress because they're fake spending cuts, but I will cover their failure today because it has implications for something else happening in Congress.
Two Senate Republicans have voted against the rescission package bringing in short of even a simple majority.
The 48-50 vote rebuffed a White House plan to claw back some $15 billion in spending previously approved by Congress — a show of fiscal responsibility that was encouraged by conservative lawmakers outraged over a $1.3 trillion spending bill in March.
The House had approved the so-called “rescissions” package earlier this month. But passage had never been assured in the Senate, where a number of Republicans had been cool to the idea from the start.
Senators Richard Burr (R-NC) and Susan Collins (R-ME) voted against rescission and this is important because if they won't vote for fake spending cuts, it's unlikely they're going to vote for the real deal.
House Republican leaders are moving a budget resolution that calls for imposing spending cuts for food stamps, health care, and everything in between in fiscal 2019 which begins on October 1st, but they've done that before. They've done that every year for the past 7 years. And where does it lead? It leads to a possible government shutdown on September 30th.
Senate Republicans have a narrow majority of just two votes right now which is even less than they've had in the past when they failed to pass the radical bills advanced by Speaker Paul Ryan and House Republicans. And as of today, it's not clear if House Republicans even have the votes to pass another radical budget resolution so close to an election.
I don't know if Democrats will win back control of the House in November, but if they do it will mark the end of the most dysfunctional and incompetent era of congressional governance we've ever seen.