Rep. Ross a wild card on party line votes

Editor’s note: Roby Brock, with our content partner Talk Business, wrote this report. He can be reached at [email protected]

With re-election to Congress no longer on the horizon, U.S. Rep. Mike Ross, D-Prescott, is a wild card for votes on contentious issues.

Political observers have pondered if he will alter his voting style – which was already unreliably partisan owing to the dynamics of his conservative district.  Ross may now be one of the most unpredictable votes in Washington.

Take his votes in the hotly-debated, high-stakes debate on raising the debt ceiling — with Congress finally approving a deal late Sunday (July 31) night. While Arkansas’ 5 other federally elected officials followed their party leadership, Ross broke ranks from both in voting against a Republican led House plan and a Democratic-sponsored Senate plan. Both measures are stalled in Congress.

“It’s crunch time and I’m tired of the partisan games and so are the American people," said Ross after the defeat of a debt ceiling solution supported by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. "This is not a compromise bill – this is another purely political move that will not solve this crisis.”

"This is not the time to draw a line in the sand and put your fingers in your ears. Let’s stop the partisan bickering, work together and find a bipartisan, long-term solution to our fiscal crisis," Ross said.

Ross was especially critical of a House budget/debt plan led by GOP House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, that narrowly passed that chamber on Friday.

“This bill is an assault on working families and seniors by proposing drastic cuts that threaten Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, while refusing to close tax loopholes or cut taxpayer-funded subsidies for special interests,” Ross said.

“This bill only raises the debt ceiling for about five months, which means we’ll have to repeat this process all over again in January, bringing our economy to the brink once more,” said Ross. “If you think nothing is getting done now, try rehashing this debate all over again closer to Election Day. This bill is unfair, unbalanced and irresponsible."

Ross invoked a call for bipartisanship in both debates. He says he advocates a compromise bill that cuts spending, reforms the tax code, while protecting Social Security and Medicare.

Obama administration officials claim that if the debt ceiling crisis is not solved by Tuesday, the United States could risk its credit rating and be forced to choose between making interest payments and funding government services.

Standard & Poor’s, one of the major credit rating agencies that analyzes America’s credit standing in the world economy, said the country is at risk of a downgrade to its AAA credit rating. Many economists believe that a credit downgrade could negatively impact world financial markets and force the U.S. to pay even more in interest rates – a key contributor to the debt crisis. Conversely, analysts have also said that continued increases to the debt ceiling and higher government spending could also negatively impact U.S. financial standing.