WASHINGTON \u2014 Will the Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee vote for another temporary spending measure to avert a government shutdown? He\u2019s playing his cards close to his vest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With just four days for the White House and congressional leaders to reach a new budget deal, HASC Chairman Mac Thornberry of Texas declined to commit his help to pass the stopgap continuing resolution that House GOP leaders say they will likely need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thornberry, who is influential with the bloc of Republicans on his committee, voted in favor of the CR passed last month but would not say Tuesday whether he supports one.
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Personally, I’d do just about anything to fix this problem, including vote for things that I might not support otherwise, but I am increasingly disturbed that support for our military is being tied to some other issue, some other agenda,” Thornberry said at a reporters\u2019 breakfast on Tuesday.
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As the fight over immigration reform entangled negotiations on a defense budget and to avert a government shutdown, Thornberry accused Democrats caring more about immigrants than the military.
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said 2018 spending should be decoupled from Democrats\u2019 insistence on a deal with President Donald Trump to extend the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy. He said tying military spending to any other issue is \u201cabsolutely wrong.\u201d
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cEvery day under a CR does damage to the military,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s disturbing to see that people would be willing to see that damage continue for some other [issue.]\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Without a deal in hand, House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., has said Congress will have to pass a fourth CR, likely into February, so negotiations can progress. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s unclear whether House Republicans can find the 218 votes needed to pass such a measure \u2014 or whether Senate Republicans can find 60 votes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some hawkish Republicans, who have railed against CRs as damaging to military readiness have threatened to vote against another temporary spending measure or also declined to commit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thornberry on Jan. 11 said he had not discussed with the Pentagon the exceptions, or \u201canomalies\u201d to a new CR, it might request \u2014 or whether their inclusion would win his vote. Last month\u2019s CR included $4.7 billion for emergency missile defense and ship repair needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOne of the points I\u2019ve tried to make is there is no number of \u2018anomalies\u2019 that can fix the damage a CR causes,\u201d Thornberry said. \u201cThe idea that you can give us a little of this and a little of that and the CR wouldn\u2019t be so bad, is blatantly not true.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thornberry said he believes lawmakers and the White House can quickly reach deals on DACA and easing caps for 2018 spending. But he questioned whether Democrats want that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBecause there are Democrats who know that many of us are concerned about the damage a CR does every day, they are trying to use our concerns about the military to promote their issues,\u201d Thornberry said. \u201cThese political games are on the backs of men and women risking their lives.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thornberry\u2019s comments echoed Trump, who said that Democrats \u201cdon\u2019t want\u201d to make a deal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cStatement by me last night in Florida: \u2018Honestly, I don\u2019t think the Democrats want to make a deal. They talk about DACA, but they don\u2019t want to help..We are ready, willing and able to make a deal but they don\u2019t want to. They don\u2019t want security at the border, they don\u2019t want to stop drugs, they want to take money away from our military which we cannot do,\u2019\u201d Trump tweeted, quoting his comments made Jan. 14 to reporters at his resort at Mar-a-Lago in Florida.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Republican chairman of the House Armed Services Committee said, “I am increasingly disturbed that support for our military is being tied to some other issue, some other agenda.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":113685,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":8,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":{"2":{"categories":["pentagon-congress","news"],"primary_category":"pentagon-congress"},"8":{"categories":["budget","management","home","daily-brief","newsletters"],"primary_category":"budget"}}},"categories":[8,160,36],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3446],"class_list":["post-51973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-congress","category-daily-news-roundup","category-newsletters"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"Q5SSWSAUCNF73MHLYP3UQVBI5Y","arc_canonical_url":"\/congress\/2018\/01\/16\/thornberry-wont-say-how-hell-vote-on-a-new-cr\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n