Good morning. The workings of Congress are usually painfully slow. So it was somewhat refreshing this week to see lawmakers pass a widely supported bipartisan bill on short notice to recognize Juneteenth as a new federal holiday. Most lawmakers and staff assumed observing the holiday would go into effect next year considering how close passage of the bill was to the 19th, but the Office of Personnel and Management announced yesterday that most federal employees will observe it for the first time today. The Capitol complex will be relatively quiet today, with many offices and dining establishments closed.
Democrats Eyeing $6 Trillion Reconciliation Package
Congressional Democrats are laying the groundwork to advance a massive bill on a partisan basis in the coming months, which could include President Joe Biden’s priorities for child care, education, and climate change. Democratic leaders are discussing a vehicle to pass roughly $6 trillion in spending through the budget reconciliation process, which sidesteps the typical 60-vote requirement for passing legislation in the Senate. Democrats won’t need to win any Republican support to advance their bill—as long as they are completely unified on the details.
The parameters for the package are being prepared by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Budget Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders. The discussion comes as progressive Democrats have grown increasingly frustrated with a lack of action on their legislative goals amid ongoing talks for a bipartisan infrastructure bill. The future of the reconciliation vehicle—what it includes and when it might take center stage—depends largely on whether the bipartisan infrastructure talks advance or fall apart. They’re not mutually exclusive, though. Democratic leaders have said that even if Congress passes a bill with GOP support that is more narrowly focused on traditional infrastructure, they would also move ahead with the more liberal items in Biden’s $4 trillion plan for sweeping social and infrastructure investments on a partisan basis.
But the vehicle Democrats are contemplating would give about $2 trillion in additional room for priorities beyond Biden’s plan. Sanders, along with many other congressional Democrats, has called for the bill to lower the age of eligibility for Medicare to 60 years old from 65 and to expand Medicare to cover dental, vision, and hearing. Some, like Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, are also discussing the possibility of including immigration measures—such as a pathway to citizenship for millions of unauthorized immigrants who were brought to the United States as children, known as Dreamers—in such a reconciliation package. (You can read Harvest’s story from this week about the state of play on immigration reform here.)
Democrats used reconciliation to approve their nearly $2 trillion coronavirus relief package earlier this year. Many Democratic lawmakers see a second reconciliation bill as one of only a few opportunities to push their goals through a deeply divided Congress before the 2022 midterms, so expect to see a lot of jockeying in the coming weeks among members about what will be included.
It’s not at all clear at this point what items will make the cut or if Democrats will ultimately be able to band together to approve such an ambitious bill. They have no room for disagreement in the Senate, and only bandwidth for a handful of members to break away in the House, assuming no Republicans support the legislation. The slightest differences over the scope of the bill and various provisions within it could derail the effort.
And there will be differences: $6 trillion is a huge amount of money. Democratic Sens. Jon Tester and Mark Warner were already expressing opposition to the price tag yesterday.
There’s also (as always) moderate Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who has displayed a preference thus far for working in a bipartisan manner rather than pushing partisan legislation through Congress. Progressives have looked to Manchin for assurances this week that he will back a new reconciliation effort even if a bipartisan infrastructure bill passes. Manchin has declined to definitively weigh in on the matter yet, saying he will decide when there is a bill to consider.
“It should be based on the merit of what the bill is,” Manchin told CNN this week. “I’m not a no, not a yes,” he added. “I’m evaluating everything.”
Infrastructure Compromise Picks up Support
A group of senators seeking a bipartisan infrastructure bill is making progress, although the odds of the plan’s success are far from certain.
The number of Republicans supporting the proposal grew from five to 11 this week—indicating the legislation could garner enough support to reach the 60-vote threshold for passage in the Senate if negotiations don’t fall apart. Ten Democrats have signed onto the plan. It would direct $973 billion to traditional infrastructure items over five years, including money for bridges, roads, broadband, and public transit. More than half of the money would represent new spending, over already-anticipated levels.
The proposal is still in early stages, and senators say they aren’t settled on how to pay for the investments. Potential pay-fors include boosting Internal Revenue Service enforcement, repurposing funds from prior coronavirus relief packages, leaning on public-private partnerships, and imposing a fee on electric vehicles. Republicans have also suggested indexing the fuel tax to inflation—a plan the White House and Democrats on the working group oppose.
Nearly every Senate Democrat would have to support the legislation to give it a chance of passage. Some, like Sen. Bernie Sanders, are already indicating they’re unlikely to back it.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said in floor remarks Thursday that the two-pronged approach—one bipartisan, and another Democratic-only—is proceeding.
“Now, despite some over-dramatized punditry, the truth is both tracks are moving forward very well and both tracks need each other,” he said.
“So we want to work with our Republican colleagues on infrastructure where we have common ground,” Schumer added. “And Democrats believe we have other priorities that the Senate must consider above and beyond a bipartisan infrastructure bill, not the least of which is addressing the urgent challenge of climate change.”
House Passes 2002 AUMF Repeal
In recent months, Democrats hoping to claw back war powers from the executive branch have said they believe some of their Republican colleagues will be more willing to rein in presidential authorities now that a Democrat is in the White House.
That theory held true on Thursday, when the House voted to repeal the 2002 authorization for the use of military force against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. When the chamber last voted to repeal the 2002 AUMF in January 2020, only 11 Republicans sided with most Democrats to pass the bill. On Thursday, that number went up to 49 Republicans.
Many of the new GOP votes came from freshmen, and several others were from members who have been in Congress longer and changed their prior stances. It was a remarkable shift in support among Republicans, underscoring the very real possibility that a repeal of the authorization could pass the Senate for the first time this year.
Proponents of scrapping the authorization note that it does not underpin the United States’ anti-terror operations today like the post-9/11 authorization still does. They argue leaving outdated authorizations on the books can lead to abuses from the executive branch.
“Now is the time for bold action to end our forever wars. We must seize this opportunity to reassert Congress’s Constitutional authority on matters of war and peace,” Rep. Barbara Lee, the California Democrat who sponsored the bill, said. “This effort extends beyond repealing the 2002 AUMF—we must also work to repeal the overly broad 2001 AUMF so that no future president has the unilateral power to plunge us into endless wars.”
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee is set to consider similar legislation to repeal the 2002 authorization along with another outdated AUMF from 1991 next week. The effort could either advance as a standalone measure or as a component of the annual defense authorization act later this year.
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