No real surprise here: The House fell short in its effort to override President Bush’s veto of legislation expanding SCHIP, the state children’s health insurance program. However, the vote shows a fairly dramatic shift on the issue since the bill first passed in August. That earlier vote was 225-204; today’s was 273-156, which is just 13 votes short of the two-thirds needed for override. Most of those switching sides to vote for the bill were Republicans. They will be putting enormous pressure on President Bush to agree to some sort of compromise — quickly.
UPDATE: Perceptive commenter ZSMorgan writes:
Compromise: please define this word. I think the definition changed in the past 7 years.
The operative definition that congressional Republicans are looking for would fall into the “face-saving” category. They’ve lost this one politically; they know it; they just want it over. I would look for them to beg President Bush to seize on any modification to declare victory and retreat.
UPDATE2: Jay Newton-Small on what’s next.