Democratic Rep. Chris Van Hollen is losing sympathy for House Speaker John Boehner as the government braces for a shutdown.
“Senator [Ted] Cruz is essentially running the show in the House of Representatives,” Van Hollen, the ranking member of the Budget Committee and former chairman of Democrats’ House campaign arm, told reporters Monday. “If Speaker Boehner doesn’t want to assert some leadership, then he should go ahead and turn the gavel over to Speaker Cruz.”
During the previous budget showdowns that have marked much of Boehner’s tenure, Democrats have expressed pity for the speaker, whom they tend to see as a once-willing negotiator who fell victim in his party’s civil war. But with just hours to go before the federal government closes for the first time in 17 years, patience for the GOP leader is wearing thin among Capitol Hill Democrats.
“At every juncture, when he has had to either exert leadership or kowtow to the far right, he has ended up throwing a bone to the far right,” Van Hollen said at a breakfast gathering sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor. “He’s been feeding the beast the whole time here.”
The House passed a bill over the weekend to fund the government through Dec. 15, but only if the Affordable Care Act, a key aspect of which goes into effect on Tuesday, is delayed by one year. Conservatives lauded Boehner for bringing that bill to the chamber floor after the Senate rejected amendments to defund the health care law. Meanwhile, Cruz has been meeting with House conservatives behind closed doors and urging them to stand their ground on the Obamacare fight — one Boehner didn’t want to have on the short-term spending bill. Democrats have capitalized on this notion that the first-term Texas senator, who has alienated himself from some of his colleagues in the upper chamber, is filling the leadership vacuum.
Democratic leaders in the Senate have urged Boehner to pass a continuing resolution to fund the government without the Obamacare strings attached. “Step up to the plate and do it,” Sen. Chuck Schumer told reporters after the Senate passed its bill on Friday afternoon. “He’s not going to lose his speakership. He’s not going to lose his election. Please, enough already.”
But that’s easy for Schumer and other Democrats to say. Boehner has brought several bills to the floor that required help from the opposition party — a measure to avert the fiscal cliff in January, a relief bill for victims of Hurricane Sandy, the renewal of the Violence Against Women Act, and others. While praised by Democrats for these moves, which they have hailed as courageous and right, Boehner endured gut punches from his members as a result.
Democrats can continue to extend their sympathies to Boehner, and insist that a “clean” continuing resolution would pass if he put it up for a vote. But if he were to take that route, Democrats appear unwilling to back him up and support his speakership afterward, when it might need a lifeline.
“I think in this case, the reward should be that you’re doing something good for the country,” Van Hollen said. The Maryland congressman dismissed the hypothetical question of whether Democrats would vote for Boehner as speaker next year if he needed their support.
“Our candidate is the Democratic leader in the House” — Nancy Pelosi, Van Hollen said. “And if [Boehner] wants to ask the Democratic leader if she wants to provide some support to him under this current configuration, it would have been the first overture we’ve seen from the speaker in a long time, but we would be happy to listen.”
For his part, Boehner commented on the budget battle in an email Monday, saying: “Senate decided not to work yesterday. Well my goodness, if there’s such an emergency, where are they?”
Van Hollen Slams Boehner, Says Cruz Is "Running the Show"
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