Republicans say President Biden
Joe Biden Obama, Clinton reflects on Mondale’s legacy Biden, Harris praises Mondale for paving the way for female VP Mondale in latest message to staff: ‘Joe in the White House certainly helps’ MOREThe $ 2.3 trillion dollar infrastructure package will have a hard time making it through the Senate intact due to several key provisions opening the legislation to parliamentary challenges under the mysterious Byrd rule.
GOP lawmakers plan to file numerous procedural objections against the final bill, arguing that several elements violate the special fiscal rules that Democrats plan to use to pass the 50-50 Senate measure with a simple majority vote.
“It’s a target-rich environment,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham
Lindsey Olin Graham ‘Real Housewives of the GOP’ – Wannabe reality show that narcissists claim the party Graham: ‘I couldn’t disagree anymore’ with Trump’s support for troop withdrawal Wall Street spent .9 billion on campaigns, lobbying in the 2020 elections: research MORE (RS.C.), the senior member of the Senate Committee on Budgets, who will be taking the point of raising procedural objections to the Democratic Infrastructure Act. “There are many problems.”
Graham said he is in talks with his staff about using the Byrd rule to block components of Biden’s infrastructure plan if Democrats continue the budget reconciliation process, bypassing a likely GOP filibuster.
At the top of the Republican target list is part of Biden’s proposal regarding legislation that would make it easier for unions to organize – a top goal of Democratic policy after Amazon soundly defeated a union strike in an Alabama warehouse this spring.
Parliamentary experts say Biden and the Senate majority leader Charles Schumer
Chuck Schumer ‘Real Housewives of the GOP’ – Wannabe reality show narcissists command the party ‘Building Back Better’ requires a new approach to US science and technology Pew poll: 50 percent approve of Democrats in Congress MORE (DN.Y.) want to use the Senate budget reconciliation process in aggressive new ways that will set precedents.
“Many of these infrastructure cases have not been ruled on in the past,” said James Wallner, a former senate adviser and senate rules expert.
“What is interesting about reconciliation now is that it is used for purposes unrelated to what reconciliation was intended for,” he said. “No one has the illusion that the reconciliation process is being used for purely fiscal reasons. It’s a way to get around the filibuster. “
The reconciliation process was instituted by the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 to make it easier for Congress to reduce the deficit by overcoming the traditional 60-vote hurdle to passing legislation in the Senate. Over the years, the interpretation of what reconciliation means has become more and more extensive.
It is up to Senate MP Elizabeth MacDonough to decide how far the Democrats can stretch the reconciliation process.
Republicans took a big win in February when MacDonough ruled that Democrats could not include language in Biden’s $ 1.9 trillion coronavirus bill to raise the federal minimum wage to $ 15 by 2025.
Republicans say they have a strong argument for scrapping part of Biden’s plan calling on Congress to Protection of the Right to Organization Act (PRO), which would curtail state employment laws and punish employers who interfere in union actions.
Under Biden’s proposal, Congress should also link federal investments in clean energy and infrastructure to a requirement for employers to pay prevailing wages and for transportation investments to comply with existing transit labor protections.
The White House argues that more unionization will boost economic growth by improving productivity.
But Republicans say measures like the PRO Act amount to changes in labor policies that violate the Byrd rule, because any changes in expenditure or income they produce are incidental.
“From my perspective, it’s almost a no-brainer: It wouldn’t pass the Byrd Rule provision,” said Bill Hoagland, a senior vice president at the Bipartisan Policy Center and a former Republican staff director on the Senate Budget Committee. “It is certainly important to the president, for his agenda, but it is only incidental from a tax policy perspective.”
Hoagland also expressed concern about the language in Biden’s plan that would give health care providers higher pay and benefits through “an opportunity to organize or join a union and bargain collectively.”
A provision in the infrastructure package would increase access to long-term care services under Medicaid by giving people on low incomes more opportunities to receive care at home. Republican critics warn that this would greatly increase Medicaid’s authority.
Another aspect of Biden’s proposal that could get in trouble with the MP is a call to “abolish exclusion zones and harmful land-use policies”.
Biden’s team argues that “exclusive zoning,” such as minimum lots, mandatory parking requirements, and bans on multi-family homes, have skyrocketed home prices and “left families out of areas of greater opportunity.”
Hoagland said these regulatory measures should be dropped from any reconciliation package.
“The unions, the union organization, the provision that pertains to the rules of rescue and everything else in it are not eligible,” he said, referring to the language that includes caregivers and exclusion zones. “Anything related to regulatory activity is not eligible either.”
One caveat to predicting how the MP might govern is that legislators have yet to draft the legislative language. The White House has only released a detailed information sheet.
Some Democratic policy experts agree that language reinforcement of union negotiators with employers seems to run counter to the senate’s rules governing what can be included in a reconciliation package.
“The Pro Act does not fit in with budget reconciliation,” said a former Democratic assistant to the Senate.
“It will not have a fiscal impact, and therefore it will be precipitated without fiscal impact in a Byrd Bath situation,” said the former assistant, referring to the process whereby Democratic and Republican aides present arguments to the MP about what should be included in a tuning package.
Her. Sherrod Brown
Sherrod Campbell BrownWorld Passes 3 Million Coronavirus Deaths Democratic Senators Call on Biden to Support Vaccine Patents Waiver Big Bank CEOS to Testify Before Congress in May MORE (D-Ohio), a prominent labor advocate, said Monday that “it is still debated” whether the PRO Act should be included in an infrastructure alignment package.
“It’s not clear yet,” he added. “It’s a really high priority for many of us.”
Her. Shelley Moore Capito
Shelley Wellons Moore CapitoOn The Money: Moderates’ 0B Infrastructure Bill Is Hard To Sell With Democrats | Justice Dept. sues Trump ally Roger Stone for unpaid taxes. OVERNIGHT ENERGY: Trump Official Postpones Release of Cancer-Related Chemical Information in Illinois: Watchdog | Advocacy groups say tech giants need to ‘step up’ on sustainability | GOP Senator: Raising Corporate Tax Is A ‘No-Start’ Moderates’ 0B Infrastructure Bill Is Hard To Sell With Democrats MORE (W.Va.), the top Republican on the Environment and Public Works Committee, said Biden’s plan would free tens of billions of dollars for unauthorized programs and create another procedural problem for Democrats.
In particular, Capito noted that Congressional approval for highway and transit funding will expire on September 30, raising questions about whether Congress can use budget reconciliation to expand highway and transit programs, or spend money for it. programs with expired authorization or no permission.
“I’m inclined that some of what the president wants to bring forward is unauthorized and you run into Byrd Rule issues whether appropriating yourself to an unauthorized program,” said Capito, a member of the Senate committee. for credits.
“I don’t know if they can pass a full bill through reconciliation,” she said.
Hoagland, the former staff director of the Committee on Budgets, said Congress solved that problem earlier this year by combining authorizations and credits into direct expenditures in the $ 1.9 trillion emergency bill.
But Hoagland warned that the temporary solution was seen as a one-time exception to avoid undermining the authority of the Senate and House committees.
Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin
Dick Durbin White House defends ‘ambitious’ goal of 62,500 refugees Biden on refugee hat: ‘We couldn’t do two things at the same time’ For a win over climate, let’s put our best player in the game MORE (D-Ill.), A senior member of the Credit Committee, said the Republicans essentially castrated the spending panel when they checked the Senate last year.
Last year, the Senate Credit Committee disappeared. No budget resolution … no subcommittee hearings, no full committee hearings, ”he said. “We are starting at a very low point in terms of what happened to the Senate Committee on Appropriations.”