Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has just this year to prove his own election-year promise — that his party can govern and keep the Senate functioning.
The Kentucky Republican has been busy proving his case that a GOP-led Senate would not be gridlocked like the one under his predecessor, now-Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., reports
The Hill.
Should McConnell fall short of that promise, Democrats could regain the Senate just two years after losing it in 2014. Republicans have to defend 24 Senate seats in 2016, but the Democratic Party will have to defend just 10.
Senate Republicans did get off to a rough start this year, when they and the House's GOP lawmakers stood off against each other when it came to linking the Department of Homeland Security's funding to immigration arguments.
But since then, McConnell-led Republicans have marked several achievements, including coming to a compromise on the Senate's anti-human-trafficking bill.
Further, a
Medicare "doc fix" bill was passed through the Senate by a 92-8 vote, and several other bipartisan deals have been reached on topics such as reviewing the pending nuclear deal with Iran, on trade, and on education.
The trafficking bill had stalled over a fight on abortion, and McConnell threatened on CBS' "Face the Nation" in March that he would not seek a confirmation vote for Loretta Lynch, the nominee for attorney general, until the bill cleared.
Initially, the Senate Judiciary Committee passed the legislation with bipartisan support, and Democrats said they voted for it because they overlooked its provision that expanded the
Hyde Amendment, a federal prohibition against using Medicaid funding to pay for abortions except in rare cases.
A
deal on the abortion prohibitions was sealed on Tuesday, and that will clear the way for Lynch's confirmation vote, McConnell said.
"I'm glad we can say there is a bipartisan proposal that will allow us to complete action on this important legislation so we can provide help to the victims who desperately need it," said McConnell. As a result, he said Tuesday he expects a vote on Lynch, who will become the nation's first black female attorney general, "in the next day or so."
The Senate plans to vote Wednesday on the trafficking legislation amendments, after which McConnell plans to call on the Lynch vote, The Hill reports.
Republican senators were urging McConnell behind the scenes to refuse to compromise on the bill's abortion language, a GOP senator, who requested anonymity to discuss his colleagues' actions, told The Hill.
"There was some concern. People were asking, 'Why are we compromising on this?' We should instead take this abortion issue they’re blocking right at them and talk about the federal funding of abortion," the senator said.
Republicans accused Reid and other Democrats of using the abortion language to block the trafficking bill and block the GOP's agenda.
"The Democrats were responding to their political base with regards to the substance of it, but I think it was also about who runs the Senate. And the Democrats are still trying to run the Senate," said Senate Republican Conference Chairman John Thune, the third-ranking member of the GOP leadership.
The South Dakota Republican said that the Democratic opposition did take time from the Senate calendar, but it also proved Republicans and McConnell's persistence could pay off.
McConnell claimed Tuesday that some Democrats have been thanking him privately for "changing the way the Senate is operating," The Hill reports.
Republicans this year have also passed a budget resolution before the congressional recess in April, and they have pushed a dozen bipartisan bills and held votes on more than 100 amendments.
"[McConnell] stated he wants to make the place work, and this is an opportunity to prove it," said Maine independent Sen. Angus King, who caucuses with Democrats.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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