GOP accuses Dems of manipulating rules to push agenda

With just over a month until the mid-term elections, House Republicans are accusing their Democratic colleagues in Congress of not playing fair. Today the ranking GOP member on the House Rules Committee, David Dreier, charged Democrats with “extreme procedural machinations" to push their agenda.

The House Rules Committee acts like a traffic cop for bills on the way to a vote. Republicans say Democrats on the committee allowed bills to proceed “at warp speed, ignoring pleas for bipartisanship and regular order.”

The GOP is especially steamed about the roadblocks put in the way of Republican amendments to recent spending bills. It wasn’t so long ago that Republicans were criticized for tweaking the rules when they were in charge.

San Dimas Republican David Dreier admitted some of those complaints were justified.

"I could do better than I did when we were in the majority before," he said. "And frankly, with what’s happened in the last four years, it won’t be too difficult to do better that what we’ve seen in the last four years."

If Republicans retake the House in November, Dreier would likely return as Chair of the Rules Committee. Dreier and fellow GOP committee members detail their complaints in a pamphlet called “The Wrong Way Congress.”