House Democrats today prominently featured the confederate flag during their floor speeches, displaying an image of the flag on a large placard and then denouncing it.
Democrats used the spending bill to fund the Interior Department as a way to force the flag issue on Republicans – after inserting several anti-confederate flag amendments to disrupt Republican support for the bill.
House Speaker John Boehner pulled the bill before a scheduled vote after Republicans protested that Democrats were using it as a political football over the Confederate flag.
“The Republicans in the House of Representatives are voting down any discussion even of battle flags, Confederate battle flags and the Capitol of the United States,” said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, calling it a “matter of values, of principle, of who we are as Americans.”