House Vote on Biden’s Agenda Imperiled by Moderate Democrats
Pelosi Aims to Keep Biden Agenda on Track Despite Disagreements
(Bloomberg) -- A handful of fiscally conservative House Democrats threaten to torpedo Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s plans to vote on President Joe Biden’s $1.75 trillion economic agenda this week even as the fractious party coalesces around deals on drug pricing and the state and local tax deduction.
Pelosi huddled behind closed doors Tuesday morning with fellow Democrats and emerged saying she is hopeful they could finalize the massive tax and spending bill by the end of the day, a remarkably quick turnaround for a party that has spent weeks haggling on the package’s details.
But with the narrowest of majorities and only three votes to spare, Pelosi’s plans for a swift vote could be scuttled by at least five Blue Dog Democrats who said they won’t support the legislation without more deficit information from the Congressional Budget Office and the Joint Committee on Taxation. In a letter to Pelosi, they echo comments made Monday by West Virginia Democratic Senator Joe Manchin.
“In order to ensure the final bill is indeed fiscally responsible, we must first have the proper CBO/JCT scoring information before any floor consideration,” the Blue Dogs wrote in a Tuesday letter to Pelosi. “Therefore, we cannot lend our support to advancing the BBB Act until we have had a chance to review these scores which provide the true cost of the legislation.”
The lawmakers -- Representatives Stephanie Murphy of Florida, Ed Case of Hawaii, Jared Golden of Maine, Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey and Kurt Schrader of Oregon -- also said they want final text of the bill “posted at least 72 hours before its consideration” so they can review the bill.
Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat whose vote is critical in the evenly divided Senate, on Monday said he was still was withholding support for the legislation until the cost analysis is done. On Tuesday, however, he indicated that he wasn’t trying to derail the Biden plan.
“We’ll get this back on track,” Manchin said Tuesday morning. “The White House knew exactly where I stand, there was a couple concerns that we had to work through.”
Democrats also are still negotiating on some key parts of the plan, but were coalescing around deals on prescriptions drug prices and the state and local tax deduction. Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said Monday that paid family and medical leave won’t make the final cut for the legislation but Democrats are still discussing expanding Medicare to cover dental and vision care.
Centrist Democrats’ call for more detailed analyses of its costs is yet another indication that Pelosi, Biden and other Democratic leaders haven’t fully sealed the deal to get the measure passed.
Pelosi is focused on the House voting on the tax and spending proposal and a separate $550 billion public works measure before she attends the United Nations climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, next week, Budget Committee Chairman John Yarmuth said Monday. Pelosi’s office has not announced when she is traveling to the summit, which lasts until Nov. 12.
Progressives have sought to leverage their support for the infrastructure bill to ensure passage of the larger economic package. On Tuesday, Representative Jimmy Gomez of California said progressives won’t support voting on the infrastructure bill before the tax and spending measure is ready. However progressives are no longer tying it to the Senate acting as well on the same legislation.
Immigration could prove to be another sticking point for Democrats. The Senate parliamentarian has ruled that two previous proposals creating pathways to citizenship do not meet strict criteria needed to push the package through the Senate using the budget reconciliation process, which allows Democrats to avert a Republican filibuster.
Representative Lou Correa of California said he and two other House Democrats -- Chuy Garcia of Illinois and Adriano Espaillat of New York -- would not vote for the economic agenda if it doesn’t address immigration.
Senate Democrats plan to put a third proposal before the parliamentarian as soon as Tuesday, and she is expected to rule in the coming days. This language would would provide temporary deportation protections for millions of undocumented immigrants.
Correa said he “absolutely” wants Democrats to overrule the parliamentarian if she doesn’t permit the latest immigration plan.
“There’s always opportunities and you have to create opportunities where there are no opportunities. And this is a big opportunity that should not be passed up,” he said.
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