Recapping yesterday's action: As is usually the case in the House, the first work day of the week was all about the suspension bills. Seven were scheduled. Six made it to the floor. Only three required roll call votes, and each of those three passed without a single vote cast against them. The odd man out from the schedule: a motion to concur in the Senate Amendment to H.R. 2297, a bill to promote the development of the Southwest waterfront in the District of Columbia.
The Senate, in addition to continuing the debate on the motion to proceed to consideration of the student loan bill, confirmed the three federal judges slated for approval today, two by voice vote, and one by roll call. In addition, they slipped two FCC commissioners through.
Looking ahead to today:
The House picks up its first regular appropriations bill of the year, and you know, it struck me yesterday that it was the Commerce, Justice, Science bill, which is a little unusual to see come up first. Lately, I think it's almost always been a defense or veterans-related appprops that makes it to the floor first, probably because there's generally less disagreement among the appropriators about those subjects. Military construction is always a popular starting point.
But I think the shenanigans with the "Sequester Replacement Act" is screwing that up this year. House Republicans want to repeal the so-called "automatic, across-the-board cuts" agreed to last August as part of the debt ceiling deal, at least with respect to defense spending. So that's probably got to be addressed first, before they can actually move a defense-related appropriations bill.
And of course, they'll be looking to make up that extra spending with cuts elsewhere, and they'll be doing it at the expense of accounts and programs already cut to the bone by the rest of the August agreement. Balking at the defense cuts is throwing everything else into disarray, too. And as a result, you've got the first appropriations bill of the year coming to the floor under a veto threat.
So they'll spend all day, and maybe a good part of the night, on this one, even though it sounds like the President isn't interested in letting this go anywhere. Not that the Senate is likely to send it on to him in its present form, anyway. And maybe it's with that knowledge that the leadership has opted to bring the bill to the floor under an open rule, meaning anyone can bring any amendment they like. I'm sure the Republican plan is pretty much to crap on all of them if they're written by Democrats, and maybe give a sidelong glance at the ones coming from their fellow Republicans. They can keep that up all night, especially knowing none of it is likely to matter.
In the Senate, the order of the day is a noon cloture vote on the motion to proceed to the student loan bill.
By the way, how are we doing with the whole filibuster and cloture thing this year, thanks to our "gentleman's agreement?" For a while there, it sort of did seem like we were seeing fewer cloture motions made. But the deal on reining in filibusters of motions to proceed fell apart pretty early in the first session, and now we're really beginning to see the numbers rack up. Today's vote is on the 83rd cloture motion filed during the 112th Congress, and really, that's not all that far off the record and near-record-setting paces of the previous two Congresses. Today's motion was filed on April 26th, and by the same date in the last two Congresses, there had been 90 filed in the 111th, and 99 in the 110th. So there's been some slack in the pace, but this 83rd filing in the 112th has already claimed the title of the third all-time highest total for an entire Congress.
So, yeah, that whole thing is kind of sucking wind right now.
Today's floor and committee schedules appear below the fold.
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