A group of moderate house-of-representatives” target=”_blank”>House< is threatening to torpedo their party’s $3.5 trillion spending plan unless House Speaker nancy-pelosi” target=”_blank”>Nancy Pelosi<
Those nine are enough to prevent the budget resolution recently passed by Senate Democrats from making it through the House. Republicans are expected to uniformly vote against it, and the party split in the House is 220-212 with three vacancies.
That injects a strong dose of drama into the process of the House passing the budget resolution, which Pelosi warned earlier this week should happen “without drama.”
The budget resolution is the key that unlocks the budget reconciliation process, which allows Democrats to circumvent the legislative filibuster in the Senate.
Democratic leaders and party progressives are planning to use that process to pass $3.5 trillion of joe-biden” target=”_blank”>President Biden’s<, D-N.Y., are unlikely to immediately cave to the demand from the moderates. A senior Democratic aide told Fox News Friday that there are not enough votes to pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill in August. The aide said there are “dozens and dozens” of Democrats who won’t vote for infrastructure until the Senate produces a reconciliation bill.
MODERATES MAY TRY TO FORCE PELOSI TO PASS $1T INFRASTRUCTURE BILL BY HOLDING $3.5T BUDGET RESOLUTION HOSTAGE
Ocasio-Cortez and other members of the left-wing “Squad” have said that they will not vote for the infrastructure bill until the Senate produces reconciliation bill. And Pelosi has repeatedly said she won’t bring it to the floor.
If progressives and leadership stick together – which it appears they will – then House Democrats could be at a loggerheads indefinitely over which part of President Biden’s agenda to pass first.
“I am not freelancing. This is the consensus,” Pelosi told House Dems on a call this week as she doubled down on their reconciliation timeline. “The votes in the House and Senate depend on us having both bills.”
Ocasio-Cortez, meanwhile. told CNN’s “State of the Union” this week that “If there is not a reconciliation bill in the House and if the Senate does not pass a reconciliation bill, we will uphold our end of the bargain and not pass the bipartisan bill.”
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Even if the moderate Democrats eventually cave to Pelosi and vote for the budget resolution, it’s no guarantee that the reconciliation bill will make it out of the Senate. Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., have said that they aren’t willing to vote for $3.5 trillion in spending. And if Democrats pare down the package to please those two, there is a chance they could lose some more progressive votes.
The House returns in less than two weeks to take up Democrat-backed voting legislation. It’s unclear if there will be any progress on the chamber’s path on reconciliation and infrastructure before then.
