Export-Import Bank Got Reprieve With No Assurances Its End Is in Sight

The House’s Republican leadership hasn’t made any promises that an embattled government bank won’t be saved again after an expected nine-month reprieve, a conservative lawmaker confirmed today.

The Daily Signal asked Republican legislators attending the monthly Capitol Hill meeting of Conversations with Conservatives whether they had received any assurances from House leadership that yesterday’s nine-month reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank would be the last.

They had not, replied Rep. Mick Mulvaney, R-S.C.

The short-term extension of the 80-year-old federal agency’s charter was included in a resolution to fund the government after the end of the fiscal year Sept. 30, a measure that passed with overwhelming support across party lines.

The charter of the Export-Import Bank also was set to expire Sept. 30, but the measure will reauthorize the agency until next June 30, assuming the Senate also approves it.

“When we have that good public policy discussion, not just in June but over the next [nine] months, we’re going to win the hearts and minds of folks,” Rep. Rob Woodall, R-Ga., said today. “We’re not going to need those assurances because we’re going to have the votes to [end the bank].”

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Conservatives including Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio, Tim Huelskamp of Kansas and Raúl Labrador of Idaho — who attended today’s gathering — had advocated that the bank’s life should end because it had turned into an engine of corporate welfare and cronyism.

All three men voted against the stopgap funding measure that included Ex-Im’s reauthorization.

Although Woodall said he was confident conservatives can win support for ending Ex-Im in coming months, Huelskamp singled out one giant beneficiary that isn’t likely to be swayed:

There’s one heart and mind we’re not going to win, and that’s Boeing. This is about one company, and they’re the ones pushing the hardest and the loudest in this town, which is the problem. This is a Depression-era hangover that’s being used basically by one company. I hope the company does well, but I don’t think it’s our job in Washington to prop up Boeing or any other entity.

Earlier this summer, bank opponents gained an ally in new House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California when he said he opposed renewing Ex-Im’s charter.

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Eric Cantor of Virginia, the House’s former No. 2 Republican, helped cut the deal reauthorizing the bank in 2012. Conservatives feared House leadership would work again with “establishment” Republicans and with Democrats to extend the agency’s life this year.

Although the funding measure gives Ex-Im a nine-month reprieve, McCarthy aides told Politico last week that the California Republican wants to end the bank and plans to work with House Financial Services Chairman Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas, to do so.

Democrats and Republicans line both sides of the debate over Ex-Im.

Huelskamp, however, said today that any discussion of the bank’s future is one Republicans need to have because “on one hand, we don’t want the president picking winners and losers, but on the other hand, we did just prop up this bank for another [nine] months.”