Conservative House Republicans intend to hold legislationreauthorizing a federal backstop for terrorism risk insurancehostage unless they get the slimmed-down version of the bill theysupport, they indicated Thursday.

They said that means Congress would have to accept aslimmed-down version of the bill this year, no bill at all, or aneight-month extension of the program that would be taken up nextyear by what they foresee as a Congress where both the House andSenate are controlled by Republicans.

In reaction, a key House Democratic staffer saw no end to theimpasse. He said one Republican, Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., has thesupport of 30 urban and moderate Republicans for an extensioncloser to the Senate version, and there are some 20 Republicans “onthe other side,” that are demanding a smaller bill.

Rep. Jeb Hensarling, chairman of the House FSC, and Rep. RandyNeugebauer, chairman of the Housing and Insurance Subcommittee ofthe FSC, both R-Texas, said they will stretch out the process whilethey educate members of the House on their version of thebill.

“Essentially it looks like TRIA's not going to be considered inJuly,” said a Neugebauer aide who declined to authorize use of hisname. He made his comment in the wake of passage of a Senateversion of the reauthorization bill supported by the industry by anoverwhelming vote of 93-4, a vote designed by the Senate toindicate support for TRIA.

Neugebauer and Hensarling believe they have the support of theHouse Republican leadership in their quest to have their version ofthe legislation as the House companion to the Senate version, whichmakes much smaller changes in the program. “We are all lockingarms, committed to moving this bill,” the Neugebauer aide said.

“We want to negotiate only once with the Senate, not with ourbill on the House floor,” then again during negotiations toreconcile the two bills, the aide said.

The aide meant that Neugebauer and Hensarling would vehementlyoppose the House using Democratic votes to send to the Senate abill much more similar to the Senate bill than the one they havecrafted.

The Neugebauer aide said the CBO study “is not an issue” becausethe Senate bill violates House rules. In a statement, Hensarlingalso made that point. “Unfortunately, the Senate's bill isessentially a status quo bill that uses a phony Washington budgetgimmick as a pay-for, meaning it can't even come to the House flooras written,” he said in a statement.

The Neugebauer aide said the headcount undertaken earlier thisweek by the House Republican leadership indicating theHensarling/Neugebauer bill would not pass the House as reported outby the House Financial Services Committee is misleading.

The Senate bill is S. 2244, the Terrorism Risk Insurance ProgramReauthorization Act of 2014. It would replace a terrorism riskinsurance backstop that expires Dec. 31.

The House bill is H.R. 4871, the TRIA Reform Act of 2014.

The House bill calls for gradually increasing the programtrigger for all non-nuclear, biological, radiological, and/orchemical (NBCR) events, from $100 million to $500 million by 2019,effectively phasing out the program for non-NBCR events.

“The narrative that's being driven is everyone's opposed to ourbill and opposed to the process moving forward,” the Neugebauerspokesman said. “That couldn't be further from the truth. Wereceived a tremendous amount of support from stakeholders. …Perhaps they haven't been as vocal.”

However, a number of the companies and trades cited by theNeugebauer aide said they supported passage of H.R. 4871 only tostart the process of reconciling a House bill they hate with themore acceptable Senate bill.

A key issue for many insurers was cited by Sen. Tim Johnson,D-S.D., in his comments Thursday during floor debate of the Senatebill.

He said the Senate raised the insurer co-pay from 15 percent to20 percent and the mandatory recoupment from $27.5 billion to $37.5billion [over five years].

Johnson noted, however, that, “we were careful” in reaching thiscompromise that the Senate did not raise the trigger, which woulddrive smaller insurers out of the market and reduce affordabilityof coverage for business nationwide, and that “this bipartisan billdoes not pick what modes of terrorism attacks would getpreferential treatment over the other forms of attacks.”

The Neugebauer aide cited a number of insurance trade groups andunderwriters and producers that said they support the House bill,but several of the trades and companies he cited said theysupported passage of the House bill only to keep the process ofultimately getting a bill moving.

The House Democratic aide was scathing in reaction to the Houseimpasse. He said that, “If so many insurers are supporting theHouse bill, why are they asking us to help them get a version ofthe bill more like the Senate version.”

He was also leery as to whether Hensarling has any interest incompromising.

“Hensarling has a different vision of government than mostpeople,” the aide said. Moreover, he said, “Hensarling is not oneto make deals.”