WASHINGTON – Conservative Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives
pushed ahead on Thursday with an effort to attach a crackdown on Middle Eastern
refugees to a $1 trillion spending bill that must pass within days to avert a
government shutdown.

With negotiations over the spending package gearing up, House
Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, in a Reuters interview, rejected the Republican
proposal to make it harder for Syrian and Iraqi refugees to enter the United
States.

Pelosi said a proposal to deny funding to Planned Parenthood,
which conservatives had been pursuing as recently as late October using a
similar legislative tactic, was not a part of the latest spending bill offer
from Republicans.

After a shooting rampage at a Planned Parenthood clinic in
Colorado on Friday that killed three people, politicians have had less to say
about the women’s health group, with rhetoric refocusing on concerns about
refugees from Syria and Iraq.

After a closed-door meeting on Thursday, House Republicans said
support was strong for a proposal to bar refugees from Syria and Iraq from
entering the United States unless top government officials certify they pose no
security threat.

Representative Matt Salmon, a conservative Republican from
Arizona, said the provision’s passage in November with a veto-proof, two-thirds
majority in the House strengthened Republicans’ negotiating position.

“Pelosi can bluff and bluster all she wants, but I think
we’re on solid ground there,” Salmon said.

Federal agencies will begin to close after Dec. 11 if new
funding is not approved or current spending levels are not extended.

Republicans also have rolled out legislation aimed at
strengthening a program that allows visa-free entry into the United States from
38 countries. The measure would deny visa waivers to people who traveled to
Iraq and Syria in the last five years and require issuance of
difficult-to-forge passports with data chips.

House Majority leader Kevin McCarthy said the mastermind of the
Paris attacks last month “bragged about the freedom of travel throughout
the world.” The California Republican added that some 5,000 Western
passport holders had traveled to Iraq and Syria in recent years.

The legislation is scheduled for a House floor vote next week,
but McCarthy, asked if it might be included in the spending legislation, said
he would support any method of putting it into law as quickly as possible.