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After all-night debate House passes budget bill early this morning

Congresswoman Chellie Pingree voted against a proposal that would eliminate funding for basic women's health care, block the EPA from enforcing pollution standards and make it impossible to implement the health care reform law passed last year.

"The priorities in this bill were all wrong," Pingree said. "We need to reduce unnecessary and wasteful spending but taking away women's access to cervical cancer screening or making it impossible for the EPA to crack down on polluters isn't the way to do it."

The vote, which came around 4:30 this morning, followed debate that lasted all night and included over 600 amendments that covered a wide variety of government programs ranging from cuts in Pell Grants for college students to a ban on spending to enforce the Wall Street reform law passed last year. Congress has to pass a bill funding the government through the end of the year before March 4th to avoid a government shut down. This bill now goes to the Senate.

"Sadly this bill was more about politics than it about eliminating unnecessary spending," Pingree said. "Passing a ban on spending to enforce health care or Wall Street reform might be a nice treat for big insurance companies and banks but it doesn't do much to help balance the budget."

Voting largely along party lines, the House failed to pass an amendment limiting spending on the war in Afghanistan, a provision that Pingree supported.