Despite significant pressure from the Bush administration and an imploding financial market, federal lawmakers had yet to reach an agreement on a proposal to use $700 billion in taxpayer funds to bail out Wall Street banks and investment firms as of press time on Monday night.

Lawmakers in both houses appeared to reach a tentative agreement on Sunday and on Monday morning, Bush praised Congress for crafting a “bold” rescue plan. But the plan was put to a vote Monday afternoon and was shot down, 228 to 205, causing another plunge in the stock market.  

With the Jewish New Year on Tuesday, it appeared a deal wouldn’t get done until Thursday at the earliest.

The rescue plan was supported by a majority of Democrats and opposed by a majority of Republicans, but large swaths of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle voted either way.

In the Bronx, Congressman Eliot Engel (17th District), a Democrat, voted for the bill, while Congressman Jose Serrano (16th), also a Democrat, voted against the bill.

Serrano cited the bill’s failure to offer enough assistance to financially distressed homeowners facing foreclosure. “I understand the need to shore up our nation’s big banks to prevent a larger problem, but I cannot support such an action if it does nothing to help the millions of people facing foreclosure,” Serrano said in a statement. “Leaving them out of this package is shortsighted and guarantees that we will have to address the problem in the next Congress.”

Without help for homeowners, Serrano said, the bill remained a hypocritical piece of legislation. “Where was this concern over the past year when our communities have suffered from the mortgage crisis? For them we were told: ‘They got in over their heads and must take responsibility for their actions.’ But when the rich bankers get in over their heads, we’re told they must be rescued.”

Last summer, Bronxites began feeling the pinch of an impending economic downturn as many of the borough’s neighborhoods, including Fordham and University Heights, were hit particularly hard by the mortgage crisis, causing many homeowners to default on their loans.

Of the 29-member New York delegation, besides Serrano, only three others voted against the bill: Democrats Maurice Hinchey (22nd) and Kirsten Gillibrand (20th district)  and Republican Randy Kuhl (29th).

Proponents of the plan say without the bailout, the nation’s economy could spiral into a freefall and increase the likelihood of a prolonged recession. Opponents like Serrano want to know why taxpayers should bail out Wall Street firms whose greed and imprudent decision-making led to their own downfall in the first place, while the majority of the population is left twisting in the wind.

“If this package had been balanced — bailing out Wall Street and Main Street, I would have been more inclined to support it,” Serrano said in his statement. “I am sad to say that it was not balanced.”

Joseph O’Brien, a spokesman for Engel, said in an e-mail that the Congressman thought, “the plan did direct the Treasury Department to implement a plan to mitigate mortgage foreclosures and to encourage lenders to modify loans or mortgages.”

[UPDATED FOR WEB] Later on Monday, Engel released a statement explaining his vote. "I vote for this measure because I believed it was in the best long and short term interest of the nation," Engel said.

He went on to say that although the bill wasn’t ideal, it was a "compromise" he was wiling to accept because it included "Congressional oversight, the elimination of ‘golden parachutes,’ the disbursement of funds in stages, and most importantly, the guarantee that the American taxpayer would receive any profit that came from the sale of the loans to the financial industry."

Several lawmakers across the nation say their constituents have raised significant questions about the bailout proposal. Serrano was one of them.

“Why did several members of my community who work hard and pay their bills come to me and say: ‘Mr. Serrano, we hear about this bailout package for Wall Street, and we have to know, who’s going to bail us out?’ Don’t they deserve a fair shake from the government too?” Serrano said in an earlier statement about the plan. 

In his statement on Monday, Engel took a swipe at some of his Congressional colleagues, who, like Serrano, voted against the bill. "Unfortunately, there were other members toady [who] were more interested in voting their ideology saying it was ‘my way or the highway.’ Other members appeared to be certain to vote ‘no’ on any version of the bill."

[Editor’s note: this story was updated from an earlier print version.]