The Senate’s “compromise” budget bill (isn’t it interesting that “compromise” always involves spending more of our money?) is expected to receive its third and final vote of approval from the Senate. From there, it will move to the House where it will reportedly be quickly approved – perhaps as early as Saturday – then moved on to Gov. Perdue’s desk.
A key ingredient to the swift approval of the budget was the support of 5 House Democrats – which gives the House a veto-proof majority (the Senate has enough R’s to not need any D’s for a veto-proof majority). Republican leadership felt it highly important to get these 5 House Dems on board in anticipation of Perdue’s veto of the budget.
So with the budget moving so swiftly to Perdue’s desk, the question becomes: will those 5 House Dems stay true to their word and vote to override a Perdue veto?
WRAL’s Laura Leslie posed this question to one of the 5:
Rep. Bill Owens, D-Pasquotank, is one of the five Democrats who voted for the House budget bill last month. All five have indicated they’re likely to vote to approve the Senate version Friday as well. (The other Dems are Crawford, Hill, Brisson and Spear.)
Sources within leadership of both parties say Gov. Bev Perdue is”extremely unhappy” with the breakaway Dems, who essentially stole her thunder by brokering their own budget deal with Republican House and Senate leaders over the holiday weekend.
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Still, Owens thinks the Governor “will probably veto” the budget anyway.
If that happens, I asked, will the Democrats hang together to uphold it?
“I think us five will probably hang together,” Owens said.
To override the veto?
“Probably so,” he nodded.
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