House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, acknowledged Wednesday that he would allow a vote in the House on a newly-minted Senate deal on debt and spending.
"We fought the good fight. We just didn't win," he said on WLW radio in Ohio.
Boehner additionally confirmed that he would "absolutely" allow the whole House to vote on a plan introduced on Wednesday in the Senate. That bipartisan plan, unveiled by Senate leaders, would fund the government through mid-January and raise the debt ceiling until early February.
The speaker conducted the interview shortly before heading into a closed-door meeting with fellow Republicans, who might be reluctant to support the deal because it extracts few concessions from Democrats and does very little to undo Obamacare.
But Boehner said he'd encourage his colleagues to vote in favor of the agreement, which he said would reopen the government as soon as Thursday.
"There's no good reason for our members to vote 'no,'" Boehner told talk radio host Bill Cunningham.