The House Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday approved legislation (HR 2829) that would withhold up to half of non-voluntary U.S. contributions to the United Nations “if, in two years, the United Nations is not collecting 80 percent of its regular budget in voluntary contributions,” Agence France-Presse reports. The panel “approved Republican Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen’s (R-Fla.) bill by a party-line 23-15 vote after an angry debate over whether such a move would enhance or diminish U.S. global influence,” the news service writes. “The proposal could pass the Republican-led House of Representatives but faces stiff opposition in the Democratic-held Senate and from President Barack Obama, all but certainly dooming the measure,” AFP notes (10/14).