76 Republicans Vote To Keep Carveouts For Groups Who Do Child Sex Changes In Spending Package

The House of Representatives overwhelmingly rejected a measure Thursday evening that would eliminate $1.3 billion in earmarks from a government funding package.

Lawmakers voted 291 to 136 on the amendment offered by leading fiscal hawk Republican South Carolina Rep. Ralph Norman, falling well short of a majority. Norman’s amendment would have nixed all of the earmarks in the Labor-Health and Human Services (HHS) bill, which contained funding for several entities that perform sex-change procedures for minors and late-term abortions.

“These earmarks are against every conservative value that is known,” Norman said on the House floor Thursday prior to the vote.

The vote notably divided the House Republican conference with 136 GOP lawmakers voting “yes” and 76 Republicans joining all Democrats who voted in opposing the effort to strip the earmarks from the funding package.

Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole, Republicans’ top appropriator, was among the GOP lawmakers who voted against Norman’s amendment.

Nine Republicans did not vote — including House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, House Majority Whip Tom Emmer and Republican Kentucky Rep. Andy Barr — despite being present for the marathon session of voting.

Heritage Action urged Republicans to vote “yes” and criticized GOP lawmakers for inserting their own earmarks into the bill.

“In demanding earmarks of their own, Republicans have opened the door to Democrats to direct taxpayer funds to entities engaged in practices that most GOP voters find abhorrent,” Heritage Action wrote.

The Labor-HHS bill passed the Senate within a larger government funding package Thursday in a vote of 341-88. The package now heads to the Senate where conservative members could try to hold up the funding bills over the inclusion of earmarks.