Passing the bill was something of a double-edged sword. Even in this polarized climate, the GOP will have a difficult time convincing Trump's potential voters that it benefits most of them (particularly when on paper, it doesn't).
This is a rare instance where progressive Democrats have been outspoken critics of this bill (though most still voted for it) and now Republicans have done a complete U-turn (publicly, at least, following Trump’s lead) and agree. There isn’t much virtue to signal when the opposition is bipartisan.
It's a factually true statement, folks. Check the vote counts, and you'll see that it went down along party lines, with Republicans in the majority of the 'no' votes. In fact, over 67% of House Republicans voted against the bill.
The White House lobbied heavily for the measure, and the Republicans in the House shot it down. That's interesting.
It's also potentially a huge score for some Democratic politicians, because for every Republican that supports the bill, they're going to need a Democrat to defect.
My impression is that Republicans voted for that bill because they were afraid that voting no would be used against them as proof that they were in cahoots with the Russians. I think that's at least a tenable interpretation.
I think this is my point, this was a very non-controversial bill made in as much as a bi-partisan way as we can. It is also very similar to what Trump called infrastructure week. Still it got 2!! republican votes in the house. In the senate it was a bit better, but still 30/50 republicans voted no.
I think if Trump proposed the very same bill more or less all republicans would have been on board.
That's 10 years old, plus I wouldn't call those voting numbers overwhelming bipartisan support. It passed, but many Republicans voted against it. All democrats voted for it...
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