The Unit­ed States House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives today dis­graced itself by vot­ing over­whelm­ing­ly to approve a Repub­li­can-backed bill intend­ed to effec­tive­ly block Amer­i­ca from tak­ing in more Syr­i­an refugees. The vote on the leg­is­la­tion was two hun­dred and eighty-nine to one hun­dred and thir­ty-sev­en, with forty-sev­en Democ­rats shame­ful­ly join­ing near­ly all the Repub­li­cans in vot­ing aye.

H.R. 4036, in the words of New York Times reporters Jen­nifer Stein­hauser and Michael Shear, “would require that the direc­tor of the F.B.I., the sec­re­tary of the Depart­ment of Home­land Secu­ri­ty and the direc­tor of nation­al intel­li­gence con­firm that each appli­cant from Syr­ia and Iraq pos­es no threat.”

The White House has made its unequiv­o­cal oppo­si­tion to the bill known, say­ing that Pres­i­dent Barack Oba­ma would veto it if it reached his desk. But it must first go through the Sen­ate, where its prospects are uncertain.

“Slam­ming the door in the face of refugees would betray our deep­est val­ues. That’s not who we are. And it’s not what we’re going to do,” Pres­i­dent Oba­ma tweet­ed ahead of the vote, adding, “Wel­com­ing the world’s vul­ner­a­ble who seek the safe­ty of Amer­i­ca is not new to us. We’ve safe­ly wel­comed 3 mil­lion refugees since 1975.”

With one excep­tion, the roll call from our region was split along par­ty lines:

Vot­ing Aye: Repub­li­cans Jaime Her­rera-Beut­ler, Cathy McMor­ris Rodgers, Dan New­house, Dave Reichert (WA), Greg Walden (OR), Don Young (AK), Ryan Zinke (MT), Raúl Labrador and Mike Simp­son (OR); Demo­c­rat Kurt Schrad­er (OR)

Vot­ing Nay: Democ­rats Suzan Del­Bene, Rick Larsen, Derek Kilmer, Jim McDer­mott, Adam Smith, Den­ny Heck (WA), Suzanne Bonam­i­ci and Earl Blu­me­nauer (OR)

Not Vot­ing: Peter DeFazio (OR)

Spe­cial jeers to Kurt Schrad­er of Ore­gon, who was the only Demo­c­rat from our region to turn his back on Syr­i­an refugees and vote for this awful legislation.

“Today’s vote to severe­ly restrict the reset­tle­ment of Syr­i­an refugees in Amer­i­ca is a fear-based, knee-jerk reac­tion that leaves fam­i­lies, women and chil­dren, the col­lat­er­al dam­age of the war rag­ing in Syr­ia, out in the cold,” said OneAm­er­i­ca Exec­u­tive Direc­tor Rich Stolz in a news release sent to NPI. “It is a betray­al of America’s most cher­ished val­ues and our char­ac­ter as a nation.”

“We are grate­ful for the moral lead­er­ship of Wash­ing­ton Gov­er­nor Jay Inslee, who led sev­er­al states in declar­ing a wel­come for those flee­ing the war in Syr­ia, and Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Adam Smith, Suzan Del­Bene, Rick Larsen, Jim McDer­mott, Den­nis Heck and Derek Kilmer for show­ing moral courage and vot­ing against puni­tive restric­tions on the set­tle­ment of refugees of the Syr­i­an War.”

“We urge Sen­a­tors Maria Cantwell and Pat­ty Mur­ray to fol­low suit. Amer­i­ca stands as a bea­con of hope for those seek­ing refuge, oppor­tu­ni­ty and a bet­ter life. We must remain true to our char­ac­ter and val­ues, and allow fam­i­lies and chil­dren flee­ing war-torn lands a place of respite. Our core val­ues as a nation demand no less.”

Sen­ate Demo­c­ra­t­ic Leader Har­ry Reid hint­ed he would be lead­ing an effort to put the bill on ice in the Sen­ate, telling reporters, “Don’t wor­ry, it won’t get passed.”

Here is the full list of Demo­c­ra­t­ic U.S. Rep­re­sen­ta­tives who vot­ed for H.R. 4036:

• Pete Aguilar (CA-31)
• Brad Ash­ford (NE-02)
• Ami Bera (CA-07)
• San­ford Bish­op (GA-02)
• Julia Brown­ley (CA-26)
• Cheri Bus­tos (IL-17)
• John Car­ney (DE-AL)
• Ger­ry Con­nol­ly (VA-11)
• Jim Coop­er (TN-05)
• Jim Cos­ta (CA-16)
• Joe Court­ney (CT-02)
• Hen­ry Cuel­lar (TX-28)
• John Delaney (MD-06)
• Lloyd Doggett (TX-35)
• Tul­si Gab­bard (HI-02)
• John Gara­men­di (CA-03)
• Gwen Gra­ham (FL-02)
• Gene Green (TX-29)
• Jan­ice Hahn (CA-44)
• Jim Himes (CT-04)
• Steve Israel (NY-03)
• Mar­cy Kap­tur (OH-09)
• Bill Keat­ing (MA-09)
• Ron Kind (WI-03)
• Annie Kuster (NH-02)
• Jim Langevin (RI-02)
• Dan Lip­in­s­ki (IL-03)
• Dave Loeb­sack (IA-02)
• Stephen Lynch (MA-08)
• Sean Mal­oney (NY-18)
• Patrick Mur­phy (FL-18)
• Rick Nolan (MN-08)
• Don­ald Nor­cross (NJ-01)
• Scott Peters (CA-52)
• Collin Peter­son (MN-07)
• Jared Polis (CO-02)
• Kath­leen Rice (NY-04)
• Raul Ruiz (CA-36)
• Tim Ryan (OH-13)
• Kurt Schrad­er (OR-05)
• David Scott (GA-13)
• Ter­ri Sewell (AL-07)
• Kyrsten Sine­ma (AZ-09)
• Louise Slaugh­ter (NY-25)
• Marc Veasey (TX-33)
• File­mon Vela (TX-34)
• Tim Walz (MN-01)

It pains us to say that some of these Democ­rats are mem­bers of the Con­gres­sion­al Pro­gres­sive Cau­cus. It’s incred­i­bly dis­ap­point­ing to see names like Louise Slaugh­ter, Mar­cy Kap­tur, and Jared Polis on this list. What on Earth were they think­ing, help­ing Repub­li­cans pass this shame­ful bill with a near­ly veto-proof supermajority?

POSTSCRIPT: The Oba­ma admin­is­tra­tion’s state­ment offi­cial­ly oppos­ing H.R. 4308 has just been pub­lished and can be read on the White House web­site.