Peninsula Daily News
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WASHINGTON — The Senate emphatically passed emergency legislation today to avoid a first-ever government default, rushing the legislation to President Barack Obama for his signature just hours before the deadline. The vote was 74-26, with Washington’s Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell voting with the majority.
Obama signed the bill little more than an hour later.
Today’s vote capped an extraordinarily difficult Washington battle pitting tea party Republican forces in the House against Obama and Democrats controlling the Senate. The resulting compromise paired an essential increase in the government’s borrowing cap with promises of more than $2 trillion of budget cuts over the next decade.
“It’s an important first step to ensuring that as a nation we live within our means,” Obama said after the vote. “This is, however, just the first step. This compromise requires that both parties work together on a larger plan to cut the deficit.”
Much of the measure, which the House passed Monday night, was negotiated on terms set by House Speaker John Boehner, including a demand that any increase in the nation’s borrowing cap be matched by spending cuts. But the legislation also meets demands made by Obama, including debt-limit increases large enough to keep the government funded into 2013 and curbs on growth of the Pentagon budget.
Earlier report:
WASHINGTON — Democratic U.S. Reps. Jim McDermott and Adam Smith are the only two members of Washington state’s congressional delegation to vote against the compromise proposal to raise the nation’s debt limit Monday night.
Among the state’s Congress members voting for the compromise was Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Belfair, whose district includes the North Olympic Peninsula.
However, Dicks spokesman George Behan told The Seattle Times that Dicks was worried about potentially risky reductions to military spending, particularly near the end of the 10-year agreement between President Barack Obama and congressional Republican leaders.
The deal uses the threat of cuts to the Pentagon budget and payments to Medicare providers to prod the parties to agree on mutually acceptable spending cuts on their own.
McDermott said in an interview with The Associated Press that the bill is bad public policy that leans heavily toward Republican anti-government ideology. The Seattle lawmaker thinks the measure should have included some level of tax revenue increase.
Smith, of Tacoma, says the plan fails to provide a balanced approach to reducing the deficit that should include cuts, revenue and reform.
The measure passed the House 269-161, with mostly Republican support.
For the latest on the debt deal from Washington, D.C., click on the “Nation/World” dropdown at the upper left, then click on “AP News.”
