WH Blesses GOP Transportation Bill
WH backs House GOP bill temporarily extending Highway Trust Fund. The Hill: "The surprise endorsement of the bill, which is scheduled to come up for a vote in the House on Tuesday, clears the way for a deal with Democrats in the Senate. For most of the year, President Obama has pushed lawmakers to approve a transportation funding package that would last four years and include $302 billion in road and transit spending. But with transportation funding expected to run out next month, the White House said Monday that Obama would accept the House's temporary measure, which would only extend transportation funding until May 2015."
House GOP's offsets undermine unemployment insurance extension proposal. Roll Call: "The roughly $10 billion highway patch is paid for with extension of customs fees and with so-called pension smoothing — which delays payments made by corporations to their pension funds, temporarily boosting their profits and taxes paid to the government. The Senate had used those same offsets to pay for its five-month, retroactive unemployment extension ... With the White House endorsing the use of those offsets for a highway patch, an unemployment extension appears even more dead.
Some Dems unhappy with Senate Finance Chair Ron Wyden's compromise. The Hill: "[Wyden] dropped a Democratic demand that lawmakers extend transportation spending until the end of the year to create a final showdown after the midterm elections. Wyden’s decision to acquiesce quickly stepped on the toes of some of his colleagues ... the White House’s decision late Monday to back a similar plan from House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-Mich.) could give Wyden less leverage in the final negotiations, particularly when it comes to the budget offsets. Still, Wyden appears to be winning the battle over how long the stopgap funding should last."
Conservative groups oppose. HuffPost: "... the bill’s passage is not preordained. Its chances, in fact, took a hit on Monday afternoon, when two anti-spending groups not only came out in opposition, but also told Republicans they would score the vote. Club for Growth said it opposed the Highway and Transportation Funding Act of 2014 and would include it on its congressional scorecard. Heritage Action for America did the same..."
Some keep hope alive for gas tax hike. Roll Call: "[The Highway Trust Fund deal] would give lawmakers about 10 months to mull a long-term transportation funding plan that might, just might, include higher gas taxes. A big change is the support that the idea has received from Republican lawmakers. Sen.Bob Corker, a Tennessee Republican, recently joined with Sen. Christopher S. Murphy, a Connecticut Democrat, to suggest boosting the gas tax by 12 cents per gallon. That would bring it in line with where it would have been if it had kept up with inflation since the tax was last raised in 1993 to 18.4 cents per gallon. Sen. Michael B. Enzi, R-Wyo., also supports indexing the gas tax to inflation ... Interest groups including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the AFL-CIO agree that raising the gas tax is necessary. The venerable automobile group AAA has become more outspoken in its support of a higher gas tax and recently endorsed the Corker-Murphy proposal. Even the American Petroleum Institute, while it does not explicitly support higher gas taxes, is not dead-set against the idea either."
GOP Tries To Move On Border Bill
Possible split in GOP over child migrant influx. The Hill: "...a House GOP working group on immigration will recommend Tuesday that the conference change a 2008 trafficking law ... Rep. Kay Granger (R-Texas), the working group’s leader, will argue that child immigrants from Central America should be subject to the same rules as those from Mexico ... Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), a vocal critic of U.S. immigration policies, said Monday that he did not expect to be impressed by the plan ... 'I expect they’re going to come to us and say we have to take this off the table. We’re going to have to give the president some money, and tie our own strings with a border security bill.'"
WH reaches out to pass border bill. Politico: "On Wednesday, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson will give a closed-door presentation to all 100 senators ... Johnson will give a presentation to the Senate on the swelling numbers of children from Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras who are trying to enter the United States primarily through the Texas border, and then take questions from lawmakers ... On Wednesday President Barack Obama will meet at the White House with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus..."
Warren Lights Up Red West Virginia
"Rock-star reception" for Sen. Elizabeth Warren as she stumps in WV. W. Post: "The rally on behalf of Senate candidate Natalie Tennant was the latest in a string of recent Warren appearances in red and blue states alike ... Warren was greeted as a progressive hero, with several attendees pleading with her to run for president. Tennant’s campaign hopes that Warren’s populist message will help her close the gap against her well-funded GOP opponent, Rep. Shelley Moore Capito."
Warren zeroes in of Capito's Wall Street ties. HuffPost: "'When [Wall Street] needs her, [Capito's] been there,' Warren said in a packed hotel ballroom. 'She's out there for Wall Street, she's leading the charge. ... We need some more people who are willing to work on the side of America's families.' ... Monday's campaign events painted a clear contrast between the camps: Capito, who serves as the chairwoman of the House Financial Services Committee's Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit, held a business roundtable the same day with Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) in Charleston, West Virginia ... Capito has frequently aimed criticism at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which Warren conceived of and helped found. The Republican, who has raised large amounts of cash from the financial services industry, is married to a Wells Fargo executive."
