Area Votes in Congress

WASHINGTON - Here is how Philadelphia-area members of Congress voted on major issues last week:

House

Keystone XL Pipeline. Voting 252-161, the House on Friday sent the Senate a bill (HR 5682) to bypass environmental laws such as the Endangered Species Act and Clean Water Act and approve the building of the Keystone XL Pipeline between the Canadian border and Steele City, Neb. This would be the final leg of a nearly 4,000-mile Keystone network for shipping tar-sands oil from Alberta to U.S. refineries in the Midwest and on the Texas Gulf Coast.

A yes vote was to pass the bill.

Voting yes: Robert A. Brady (D., Pa.), Charles W. Dent (R., Pa.), Michael Fitzpatrick (R., Pa.), Frank A. LoBiondo (R., N.J.), Pat Meehan (R., Pa.), Donald Norcross (D., N.J.), Joseph R. Pitts (R., Pa.), Jon Runyan (R., N.J.), and Christopher H. Smith (R., N.J.).

Voting no: John Carney (D., Del.), Matt Cartwright (D., Pa.), Chaka Fattah (D., Pa.), and Allyson Y. Schwartz (D., Pa.).

Not voting: Jim Gerlach (R., Pa.).

Liability for oil spills. By a vote of 192-224, the House on Friday refused to require the Keystone XL Pipeline to pay into the Treasury Department's Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund. Sponsored by Democrats, this motion to HR 5682 (above) sought to blunt an Internal Revenue Service ruling under which crude extracted from tar sands is exempted from mandatory support of the oil-spill fund. The ruling spares TransCanada Corp., the Keystone owner, from having to pay 8 cents per barrel into the fund to help cover the cost of cleaning up any spills.

A yes vote was to require the Keystone XL Pipeline to contribute to the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund.

Voting yes: Brady, Carney, Cartwright, Fattah, Norcross, and Schwartz.

Voting no: Dent, Fitzpatrick, LoBiondo, Meehan, Pitts, Runyan, and Smith.

Not voting: Gerlach.

Senate

Federal child-care subsidies. By a vote of 96-1, the Senate on Thursday advanced a bipartisan bill (S 1068) that would reauthorize the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act through fiscal 2019 at a cost of $13.1 billion over five years. The program provides subsidies to help low-income families afford child care.

A yes vote was to move the bill forward.

Voting yes: Cory Booker (D., N.J.), Thomas Carper (D., Del.), Bob Casey (D., Pa.), Chris Coons (D., Del.), Robert Menendez (D., N.J.), and Pat Toomey (R., Pa.).

This week. The House will take up bills to change certain Environmental Protection Agency procedures, while the Senate will debate bills to authorize the Keystone XL Pipeline and renew the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act.