Senate Passes HR 3236

This afternoon the Senate passed HR 3236, the Surface Transportation and Veterans Health Care Choice Improvement Act of 2015, by a very bipartisan vote of 91 to 4. All four no votes came from Republicans. The bill extending the current surface transportation authorization until October 31^st now heads to the President for signature. TheHill.com is reporting that the President is expected to sign the bill.

Earlier in the afternoon the Senate passed HR 22 (which was the Hire More Heroes Act of 2015) which has become the bill that will provide long term authorization of surface transportation programs. That vote, 65 to 34, was still fairly bipartisan, but in a way that is becoming more common in the 114^th Congress; Republican conservatives made up almost half of the no votes.

Because this bill has been formulated as a series of amendments (including the basic amendment that completely replaces the original bill language) to the original bill, it is difficult to tell what the actual provisions of the bill look like. We should be able to see the version as passed by the Senate tomorrow or Saturday.