‘Outrageous partisan poison pills’: Dems threaten to torpedo government-funding bill targeting noncitizen voting

Democrats are already pushing back against a Republican-led plan that would temporarily fund the federal government until March, decrying a separate bill attached to the measure that requires proof of U.S. citizenship for voter registration.

Speaker Mike Johnson is planning to introduce the continuing resolution (CR) next week with the hotly-contested SAVE Act tethered to it, which would require proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections, Punchbowl reported Tuesday. At the same time, a number of Democrats have called the effort a nonstarter and encouraged Republican lawmakers to be more “bipartisan.”

“As we have said each time we’ve had a CR, the only way to get things done is in a bipartisan way and that is what has happened every time,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer told Punchbowl.

The SAVE Act was spearheaded by Republican Rep. Chip Roy of Texas with five Democrats joining 216 Republicans to pass the bill in July. Roy preemptively claimed that Democrats playing “pure politics” would cause the bill to fail.

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“Recall – the “SAVE” Act (I introduced it – HR8281) passed with 5 Democrats voting for it (and others privately wanting to),” Roy said in a Monday post on X. “If they vote “no” with it attached to a funding bill that funds government to March – it’s pure politics.”

“Demanding outrageous partisan poison pills is a nonstarter — we’ve seen this movie before and we know how it ends,” Democratic Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Patty Murray of Washington told Punchbowl. “Senate Democrats will continue to work in a bipartisan way to ensure we can keep the government funded and deliver responsible, bipartisan spending bills that can actually be signed into law before the end of the year.”

Meanwhile, Roy’s Democratic colleagues are aiming to pin the blame on Republicans if the funding bill doesn’t go through.

“We cannot fund the government — with full-year funding bills or a continuing resolution — without the support of both Democrats and Republicans in the House and the Senate,” Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut told Punchbowl. “But just like last year, House Republicans have taken the process of funding the government down a partisan path — forcing us to consider extreme, harmful funding bills that have no chance of becoming law. And just like last year, House Republicans’ refusal to meet House Democrats at the table has left us without time to pass all 12 bills before the end of September.”

Last year, the House also failed to pass all appropriations bills, which prompted Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida to file a motion to vacate then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy. McCarthy was subsequently ousted in a 216-210 vote, with Republican Reps. Gaetz, Bob Good of Virginia, Tim Burchett of Tennessee, Eli Crane of Arizona, Matt Rosendale of Montana, Andy Biggs of Arizona, Ken Buck of Colorado and Nancy Mace of South Carolina voting alongside 208 Democrats.

The House most recently passed four CR’s in February to prevent a government shutdown. The most recent passed the House and the Senate on Feb. 29, while the previous CR’s for fiscal year 2024 passed on Jan. 18, Nov. 15 and Sept. 30.

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