GOP Rep. Peter King of New York
It's not just Senate Republicans anymore. Some GOP House members are warning that shutting down Homeland Security over Obama's 2014 immigration actions is not the work of sane people. From the
New York Times:
“We can’t allow D.H.S. [to] not be funded,” said Representative Peter T. King, Republican of New York. “People think we’re crazy. There’re terrorist attacks all over the world, and we’re talking about closing down Homeland Security. This is like living in the world of the crazy people.”
We couldn't have said it better ourselves, Mr. King.
According to a whip list in The Hill, at least 10 GOP House members are inclined to agree with Rep. Peter King (not to be confused with Rep. Steve King of Iowa, chair of the House crazies) and vote for a "clean" bill to fund Homeland Security. However, 15 others are on record saying, "Not gonna do it."
If Boehner puts a clean bill on the floor, he can afford to lose 28 Republicans of his 245 and still meet the 217 threshold to pass the bill.
But the other way of looking at it is that he only needs 29 Republicans to pass a clean bill if all 188 Democrats vote for it.
So in some ways, it might still come down to whether Boehner's job is more important to him than the safety of the nation—if Senate Republicans can get it together to pass the bill (Senate Democrats are ready to do it "right now," per Sen. Harry Reid this morning). Republicans might just be too busy making CPAC speeches today to fund Homeland Security.