Pelosi feels ‘no ownership’ for spending deal

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said she feels no ownership
for the spending deal the House approved Thursday.

Pelosi took pains Thursday to distance herself from the
bipartisan 2011 spending deal, which many House Democrats think goes too far in
imposing spending cuts on health, education and nutrition programs.

“It was pretty evident the House Democrats were not a part
of that agreement,” Pelosi said at a press conference in the Capitol ahead of the vote. “I feel
no ownership of that or any responsibility to it — except that we don’t want to
shut down the government.”

{mosads}In the end, Pelosi voted against the continuing
resolution, which was negotiated last week between House Republicans and
Democratic leaders in the Senate and the White House. A total of 108 Democrats opposed it.

The California liberal noted the “unease” many Democrats feel about the almost $40 billion in cuts included in the proposal, but she also
left room to support the measure if Republicans can’t summon the votes to
prevent a government shutdown.

“I have always thought that if he [the House Speaker] didn’t have enough votes, if he didn’t get 218 on his own,
that there would be Democrats who could help put it over the top,” Pelosi said.
“It’s a question of how big that disparity is.”

“It is very important to keep government open,” she added. “We
all support that.”

Still, Pelosi was also quick to emphasize ahead of the vote that Democratic leaders in the House had no intention of whipping rank-and-file members into supporting it.

“We have not whipped it, we have not encouraged one way or
the other,” Pelosi said. “People are just making their own judgment about it.”

As details of the agreement were released this week, a
number of conservative Republicans have balked at the almost $40 billion in
cuts included in the proposal. Pressured by Tea Party groups, some are
threatening to vote against the deal even as Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) is trying to play up the
cuts as the most significant in decades.

Pelosi implied that Republicans came out on top during the
negotiations.

“The fact that many of us [Democrats] have our unease of
what is in there should signal to the Republicans that they should probably feel
pretty comfortable with the bill,” Pelosi said.

If the measure passes the House Thursday, the Senate is
expected to take it up later in the day.

This story was initially published at 11:48 a.m.