By Kevin Cirilli
House Democrats are looking to force a vote on reauthorizing the Export-Import Bank.
House Democratic leadership filed a discharge petition Thursday in an effort to compel a vote on the 80-year-old bank before its charter expires on June 30.
For the maneuver to succeed, 218 House members must support it. The effort is led by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and three members of the House Financial Services Committee: Reps. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), Gwen Moore (D-Wis.) and Denny Heck (D-Wash.).
Republicans are deeply divided on the issue. Tea Partyers, led by Financial Services Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas), say the bank’s financing programs amount to corporate welfare.
Hensarling, whose panel has jurisdiction on the issue, hasn't committed to moving the bill through.
Other Republicans and Democrats argue that Ex-Im helps sustain U.S. jobs while letting American companies make inroads in markets overseas.
It's unlikely that the discharge petition will pass since about 40 House Republicans would have to support the Democratic-led effort, according to sources on both sides of the issue.
It's also unclear what House leadership will do on the issue. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) provided little clues to reporters on Thursday.
"Listen, I support any plan that [Hensarling] can get through his committee, whether it would reform the bank, wind it down," Boehner said. "But there are thousands of jobs on the line that would disappear pretty quickly if the Ex-Im Bank were to disappear. ... The risk is that, if he does nothing, the Senate is likely to act, and then what?"
Hensarling told reporters on Thursday that most Republicans on the committee oppose the bank.
“With such a strong display of bipartisan support, it is shameful that just a handful of the Republican Party’s most extreme members are putting America’s economic interests at risk," Moore said in a statement.
“Democrats will not sit by and allow the bank to close down without doing all we can to ensure it continues to be an engine of jobs and economic growth,” Waters said in a statement.
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