NEW YORK: The fight over continuing the Export-Import Bank, a government-chartered bank that helps American companies finance export deals, could hit the Senate floor next week.
A spokesman for Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., confirmed Friday that Kirk will offer an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would continue the bank beyond its charter, which is set to expire at the end of June. Debate is expected to continue Monday on the $612 billion Pentagon 2016 spending blueprint that includes $1.2 billion to continue construction of a dozen F/A18-E/F Super Hornets built by Boeing in St. Louis.
While all St. Louis-area members of Congress favor continuing the Export-Import Bank – echoing Kirk’s claims that it is a vital tool for companies like Boeing to compete against state-financed foreign competitors – the question about whether the bank deserves to be re-authorized has split Republicans in Congress.
Prospects for the Export-Import Bank, which makes loans and loan guarantees for American companies and their customers, are especially up in the air in the House of Representatives. Amending a defense bill with a re-authorization provision could force pro-defense Republicans who have questions about the bank to support it as part of the total package.
While companies and business groups aligned with Republicans are pushing for re-authorization of the Depression-era institution, many House Republicans, including powerful leaders like Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., say the bank is corporate welfare and that companies can get financing in private markets.
Ryan has labeled it an example of “crony capitalism” that favors large companies.
They have powerful ideological allies, including Heritage Action, the activist arm of the conservative think tank Heritage Foundation. That group on Friday decried the possibility that Kirk and others would offer the Export-Import Bank’s reauthorization as an amendment to the Defense bill.
“The Export-Import Bank plays no role in protecting our national security and it is deplorable Senators would attempt to advance this slush fund for corporate welfare on the backs of our brave men and women,” Heritage Action Chief Executive Officer Michael A. Needham said in a statement.
Kirk visited the Boeing plant in St. Louis last month to push his bill. He says that 388 Illinois exporters – many of them relatively small businesses – have benefitted from financing under the Export-Import Bank since 2007. Kirk says that without Ex-Im financing, Boeing also would be at a disadvantage in its production of 737 planes as opposed to China’s C919.
Advocates of the bank point out it pays for itself and even brings a small amount of money back to the treasury. A coalition consisting of the Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and other business groups has run advertisements and organized letter campaigns and meetings with members of Congress and users of the Ex-Imp Bank.
The coalition says that over the past six years, exports financed by the bank have supported about 1.3 million American jobs and generated about $2.7 billion for taxpayers.
Further complicating the equation: President Barack Obama has threatened to veto the defense bill because he says it locks in sequestration spending cuts he wants to end.
