When Sweeney votes with the Democrats

The Hill reports:

In a relatively easy vote, the House approved its annual budget early Thursday morning after GOP leaders struck a deal with centrist Republicans.

The bill passed after leadership promised holdouts they would restore the entire $7.2 billion to the labor, health and human services (HHS) appropriations bill that had been left out of the bill.

The measure passed, 218-210, with 12 Republicans voting against the annual spending blueprint and unanimous opposition from chamber Democrats.

John Sweeney is one of 12 Republicans who voted against leadership’s budget. All but two of the Republicans who voted against the budget are expected to face challenging reelection races in November.

This is one of the problems that we have, the Rs are trying to convince us that Mr. Sweeney is an independent Republican, all of the Democrats voted against this bill. Only 12 Republicans did. So, my question is... if the Democrats unanimously did the right thing but the majority party passed a bad bill anyway, why not just elect Gillibrand to represent us?

An article we linked to previously stated that the Republican leadership is allowing some of its members in tight races to vote against the party. As long as they know that they're going to get the bills they want passed, they don't care. All that matters to them is holding their majority and keeping up business as usual. So remember, when Sweeney votes with Democrats, don't fall for the hype, it's all part of Karl Rove's strategy.