Boehner: "No threat" of government shutdown

Updated: 4:16 p.m. ET

House Speaker John Boehner assured reporters Thursday "there's no threat of a government shutdown" despite the failure Wednesday night of a House bill to fund the government after September 30.

Boehner, speaking at a news conference, targeted Democrats for "playing politics" with the $1.043 trillion Continuing Resolution, which would have kept the government running past the end of the fiscal year on September 30th through November 18th.

Notably, 48 Republicans voted against the bill, which failed with a final tally of 195-230. Six Democrats voted for it.

"This Continuing Resolution was designed to be a bipartisan bill and we had every reason to believe that our counterparts across the aisle were supportive," he said. "They decided to play politics and vote against disaster relief for millions of Americans that have been affected by it."

Many Democrats voted against the CR because they believed the bill failed to include adequate disaster funding.  Conservative Republicans, on the other hand, argued that the bill did not cut enough spending.

According to two GOP aides, Republican leadership is looking to bring the same Continuing Resolution to the floor with a tweak that adds an offset eliminating the Department of Energy loan guarantee fund that distributed money to Solyndra, a recently-bankrupted green energy company that the Obama administration is taking heat for supporting.

In a press conference following Boehner's remarks, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said House Democrats would oppose a bill that included offsets to disaster relief funding.

"We're not going to balance the budget on the backs of people who've been affected by natural disasters," she said.

"This was a very important message to the Republicans that if they're going to have a bad bill they're going to have to produce their own bad votes," Pelosi added. "We want them to move to a better place."

Boehner suggested Thursday he had understood the hurdles the bill faced before going into a vote, noting that while he "understood what the risks were," he has "no fear of allowing the House to work its will."

"Does it make my life a little more difficult? Yes it does," he said. "Trying to get 535 people to come to an agreement on anything around here is difficult - but we've known that going in; we'll work our way through this."

When asked how subsequent changes to the bill aimed at courting Democratic lawmakers could further push away Republicans, Boehner replied: "Welcome to my world."

The speaker said he would be meeting later in the day with lawmakers to discuss a plan for going forward. Congress has until September 30 to come up with a compromise to fund the federal government and avoid a shutdown.