Reacting to the fast-moving developments on Capitol Hill in real time, Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) said he was stunned by House Republicans pulling an expected vote on the Senate’s budget blueprint.
The scrubbed vote came Wednesday evening as Republican holdouts refused to get behind the bill – even as President Donald Trump urged lawmakers to pass the budget ahead of the delayed vote.
Goldman said nixing the House vote was always a possibility “because right now they don't have the votes.”
“My understanding is that a number of the holdouts on the Republican side were in a side room off the House floor talking to President Trump, who was trying to twist their arms in order to get them to buy into the budget,” the New York Democrat said in a CNN interview Wednesday.
Goldman went on to reveal what most surprised him about the new developments.
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“What I find quite remarkable is that the holdouts on the Republican side appear to be the more extreme right members of the House Freedom Caucus who are unsatisfied with the guarantees of spending cuts that exist on the Senate side of this bill,” he said. “None of the moderate Republicans who are effectively going to vote to cut Medicaid if they vote yet again for this budget resolution seem to have a problem with it.”
He added: “The math does not work out,” as he lamented against dramatic cuts to Medicaid benefits.
“So I'm not surprised that some of the Republicans have held out and will push this off,” Goldman said. “I’m only surprised at which ones it is. It's not the moderates who profess to care so much about Medicaid, Social Security and Medicare and are willing to throw them under the bus with this bill.”
