WASHINGTON, D.C. — West Virginia First District Congressman David McKinley says he didn’t risk shutdown of the federal government with his opposition to a funding bill that passed early Friday morning.
McKinley said Friday on MetroNews Talkline there was a plan in place to continue government funding no matter how the vote went.
“There was no chance whatsoever of shutting down government, period,” McKinley said.
The congressman’s opposition is based on being given a large bill with very little time to read it and no chance to offer changes to it.
“This is emblematic of some of the systems that are broken here where we have a 16 or 17-hundred page bill here and we’re given less than two days to read it,” McKinley said. “We weren’t able to amend it. It was that age-old way of doing things and I’m going to rebel against that.”
The bill is now before the U.S. Senate. A vote may not come until later in the weekend.
McKinley hoped to get funding for mental health issues and coal miners’ pensions in the legislation but that’s not in the $1.1 trillion bill. The measure does cut funding to the EPA and increase funding for fossil fuel research.
West Virginia Third District Congressman Nick Rahall also voted against the bill. Second District Congresswoman Shelley Moore Capito voted in favor.
“As we near the holidays, Americans deserve the certainty of knowing that the federal government is open and operating. Shutting down the federal government is simply not an option,” Capito said in a release after the vote.
McKinley said Capito may have a way to read such a large bill in a short period of time but he doesn’t.