Senate Fails at Two Attempts to Move Ahead With Bill Preventing a Shutdown

With only three days left in the fiscal year, the Senate on Tuesday afternoon twice came up short of votes for advancing debate on a stopgap spending bill that would keep the government open until after the November elections.

Nay votes on considering what is called a continuing resolution came from Democrats and a few Republicans. Two attempts to invoke cloture, which requires 60 aye votes, failed: 45-55 and 40-59.

The CR has been called a “clean bill” by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., with controversial riders on such issues as defunding Planned Parenthood gone. It also contains long-sought money to combat the Zika virus and aid for flood victims in Louisiana. But Democrats still insisted on funding for victims of lead-polluted water in Flint, Mich.

The House is reportedly waiting for the Senate to act before taking up the bill to avoid a government shutdown; some House Republicans say they plan to add money for Flint to a water development bill now on the floor.

The Senate CR also includes the fiscal 2017 Military Construction-Veterans Affairs spending bill, which has controversial language on creating a central whistleblower office at the VA as a response to recent scandals.  The language would punish VA supervisors for inappropriately handling whistleblower disclosures, in addition to tying their performance evaluations and bonuses to how well they handle whistleblower complaints. 

Though such an office is called for in a House-passed VA reform bill (H.R. 5620) titled the VA Accountability First and Appeals Modernization Act, the language inserted in the Senate version of the stopgap bill mirrors that in a bill (S. 2291) by Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill.

It would require the VA secretary to create a central whistleblower office, or Office of Accountability Review, separate from the VA general counsel to investigate whistleblower complaints. That language is considered weaker and such an office not sufficiently independent by employee groups and organizations that advocate for whistleblowers.

Bill Valdez, the new president of the Senior Executives Association, on Tuesday sent a letter scolding senators for being stuck once again in a “CR Hell,” which “stymies executive branch decision-making, procurements [and] long-term investments.”   

But more specifically, Valdez wrote that “The proposal to institute a new, politically controlled, non-independent, Central Whistleblower Office at the VA would create a wolf in sheep’s clothing, as we fear the office would be used to facilitate retaliation and cover-ups. The provisions also institute new obligations on supervisory employees to handle whistleblower disclosures, yet fail to recognize that supervisors and managers do not have the independence, experience, capacity, power or statutory authority that investigators and auditors with the VA’s Office of Inspector General have to fully assess disclosures.”

His concerns were echoed by Danielle Brian, executive director of the nonprofit Project on Government Oversight. “We have grave concerns and think it’s irresponsible to create a Central Whistleblower Office at the VA without proper independence,” she said. “By housing this office within the VA, we worry it risks becoming an internal clearinghouse to help agency managers identify and retaliate against whistleblowers. This language should be removed before the Senate votes on this measure.”