House speaker 'poisoned' debate, claim Republicans

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “poisoned” the debate over a $700bn (€482bn) rescue package for the United States’ economy and caused the bill’s failure, Republicans said today.

John Boehner, the Republican minority leader in the US House of Representatives, blamed the Democrat’s speech for introducing partisan politics into a bipartisan effort to approve the bill.

But Democrat Barney Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said he was shocked that the Republicans had put themselves before their country because of “hurt feelings” over the speech.

The bill was defeated 228-205 in the lower house of the US Congress and stock markets plunged as a result.

In her speech during the House debate, Ms Pelosi blamed Mr Bush’s “reckless economic policies”, “fiscal irresponsibility” and an “anything goes economic policy” for the crisis.

“No regulation, no supervision, no discipline, and if you fail you will have a golden parachute and the taxpayer will bail you out,” she said.

“Those days are over. The party is over.”

John Boehner said: “I do believe we could have got there today, had it not been for this partisan speech that the Speaker gave on the floor of the House.

“The Speaker had to give a partisan voice that poisoned our conference, caused a number of members that we thought we could get to go south.”

Adam Putnam, the Republican conference chairman, said the process “took a very marked partisan turn at the end of the debate”.

House Republican whip Roy Blunt added: “We did think we had a dozen more votes going to the floor than we had.”

He said “so much partisan discussion in what should have been a bipartisan effort to solve this problem for the American people” caused Republicans to vote against the bill.

Later, Ms Pelosi said Democrats understood “the gravity of the situation” and that “action was necessary to stabilise the markets and to protect the taxpayer”.

“We delivered on our side of the bargain,” she said.

“Clearly that message has not been received yet by the Republican caucus.”