http://nationalreview.com/corner/359829/kevin-mccarthy-house-will-send-third-volley-senate-if-reid-rejects-last-nights-bill Kevin McCarthy: House Will Send Third Volley to Senate if Reid Rejects Last Night’s Bill
By Jonathan Strong
September 29, 2013 9:29 AM
House GOP whip Kevin McCarthy said the House will send a third government-funding bill with “a few other options” if the Democratic-controlled Senate rejects the bill passed in the House last night, as expected.
“We will pass a bill . . . that will keep the government open, that will reflect the House, that I believe the Senate can accept, that will have fundamental changes to Obamacare that can protect the economy for America,” McCarthy said on Fox News Sunday.
The remarks confirm National Review Online’s reporting yesterday that House leadership is considering an eleventh-hour play like passing a “clean” continuing resolution (CR) with language added to end a subsidy for congressional staffers to purchase health insurance.
McCarthy said there are “a lot of items on the table” in discussions about which provision to add to an otherwise clean CR.
From discussions with rank-and-file Republicans late into the evening last night in the Capitol, it’s clear the plan will run into some resistance from the GOP conference. The closed-door meeting where Speaker John Boehner announced the latest plan turned into something of a pep rally, producing a unified conference ready to charge into battle with Obama. Boehner did not mention the next step to his strategy to his members, and at least most of them did not appear to anticipate he would be going in that direction.
On two occasions in the past several weeks, GOP leadership has unveiled a plan only to see conservatives quickly defeat it, prompting questions over whether that could happen again as le
