House votes to revive U.S. Export-Import Bank, dealing defeat to GOP hardliners

On Tuesday, the House voted, 313 to 118, to resuscitate the U.S. Export-Import Bank, an 81-year-old trade lending agency whose charter lapsed earlier this year. Free-market conservatives and most Republican leaders opposed reviving the bank, but Republican supporters and Democrats forced a vote by employing a little-used parliamentary maneuver to bring the bill out from the jurisdiction of the House Financial Services Committee, whose chairman had refused to allow a vote on it. In the end, a majority of Republicans and all but one Democrat voted in favor of the measure.

A large bipartisan majority of the Senate also approved renewing the Ex-Im Bank charter in July, overcoming a conservative filibuster, but that measure was attached to a transportation funding bill. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) opposes reviving the bank, but now that both chambers have backed it with large majorities, backers may prevail in getting the measure included in the final transportation bill.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) supports Ex-Im and wanted it approved before he steps down this month, but his presumptive replacement, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), noted his "strong disapproval" on Tuesday, saying he thinks "there are plenty other ways to expand opportunity in this country, and corporate welfare is not one of them." Supporters, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and labor groups, argue that extending loans to foreign customers buying U.S. goods creates (and preserves) jobs and boosts U.S. exports.

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