Fate of the Export-Import Bank Now in the Hands of the Senate

Centrist Republicans teamed up with Democrats Tuesday to defy the GOP leadership of the House of Representatives and pave the way for lawmakers to rescue the Export-Import Bank, an agency meant to facilitate U.S. business activity abroad.

On Tuesday, this unlikely alliance teamed up to reauthorize the agency, colloquially known as the Ex-Im Bank, through Sept. 30, 2019. The legislation passed easily Tuesday evening, with 313 votes backing the bank and 118 opposing it. The charter of the 81-year old export credit bank expired June 30, after right-wing conservatives blocked efforts to renew it because they argued it violates free-market principles.

The fate of the agency now moves on to the Senate, where Republican Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said Tuesday he would not devote any more floor time to the bank. He said that the best path forward was to try to attach it to a transportation funding bill. In late July, Senate lawmakers voted 67-26 to revive the Ex-Im Bank.

It took a rare procedural move by the pro-business Republicans to even get to Tuesday’s vote. On Monday, they bucked conservatives like Republican House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California. After McCarthy declined to schedule a vote on the bank, 62 GOP centrists teamed up with 184 Democrats, in a 246-177 vote, to start a discharge petition. This took the fate of the bank out of House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling’s hand. The Texas Republican opposes Ex-Im Bank because he thinks loan guarantees put taxpayer money at risk.

A discharge petition hasn’t been used since 2002, when lawmakers used it to advance campaign finance reform legislation. According to the petition’s sponsor, Rep. Stephen Fincher, a Republican from Tennessee, it was the only way to move forward on the bank.

“This discharge process offers the only means by which a majority of House members can secure a vote on a measure that is opposed by the chairman of the committee of jurisdiction and House leadership,” Fincher said during floor debate Monday.

Since the Ex-Im Bank went dark, the business community has loudly protested the lapse. Boeing, the aerospace giant based in Washington state, had 14 percent of its total 2014 orders supported by Ex-Im guarantees. In August, the company said it would cut “several hundred” jobs due, in part, to a slowdown in business because of the absence of the bank’s financing.

General Electric, the massive American manufacturer, said in September it would send 500 jobs overseas due to a loss of business because the bank is closed. “In a competitive world, we are left with no choice but to invest in non-U.S. manufacturing and move production to countries that support high-tech exporters,” John Rice, G.E. vice chairman, said at the time.

The Business Roundtable, which represents leading U.S. companies, is also an Ex-Im champion. According to the group, in 2013, the bank “enabled more than $37 billion in export sales from thousands of U.S. companies, supporting an estimated 205,000 export-related American jobs.“

The GOP rebellion comes as House Speaker John Boehner prepares to leave his post. His exit was prompted by opposition from the House’s conservative Freedom Caucus, which led the push to kill the agency.

Still, accolades from the business community did little to assuage Republicans opposed to reopening the bank for business. This group includes Republican Rep. Paul Ryan from Wisconsin, the favorite to replace Boehner as speaker. On Tuesday, he dismissed the bank as “crony capitalism.”

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