It's 1-1 in the ongoing rift between U.S. President Barack Obama and the Republican Party. While the GOP appears to have the upper hand in the immigration reform debate, Obama won in the Keystone issue.

Fox reports that the GOP was short by five votes to override the veto made by the president on the Keystone Pipe project.

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Despite the Senate being controlled by the GOP, the vote on the override was 62-37. Sixty-seven votes were needed to override a presidential veto.

Indiana GOP Sen Dan Coats called the defeat of the override a loss for the American economy and workers.

"Obama and a majority of Senate Democrats have said no to creating new jobs and increasing our energy security. Despite support from the majority of Americans, this important pro-growth project remains in political paralysis," he said.

However, one of the major sponsors of the defeated bill, North Dakota GOP Sen. John Hoeven, said he would reattach the legislation to another bill and win the Keystone war. He mulls attaching it to a highway infrastructure bill.

Democrats oppose the project because it would support Canada's tar sands oil project, which emits too much greenhouse gas and adds to the worsening global warming situation.

Obama vetoed the legislation because he wants the State Department to first complete its impact studies before a final decision is made.

Senate Majority leader Mich McConnell described the situation as the president siding with moneyed special interests than the middle-class American.

Outgoing Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer found efforts to override Obama's veto as a ludicrous idea and thumbed down the proposal to attach Keystone to highway legislation.

Boxer bewailed the GOP holding homeland security funding hostage to immigration and now the highway bill hostage to "big polluting Canadian special interests."

TagsKeystone Pipeline, GOP, Barack Obama, United States Senate, Republican Party