WASHINGTON — Democratic leaders could start the process of producing a filibuster-proof coronavirus relief package next week by taking up a budget resolution for the current fiscal year, according to Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.
“I think the budget resolution will be up next week,” the incoming Senate Budget chairman told reporters Tuesday.
The budget blueprint, which will contain instructions to authorizing committees to draft pieces of the COVID-19 aid bill within their jurisdictions, can go directly to the Senate floor without a committee markup under a provision of the 1974 law that created the modern budget process.
Democratic leaders have been considering several options to speed through passage of President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 rescue plan.
Under one scenario being discussed, the House could also act next week on a so-called skinny fiscal 2021 budget resolution, which would also skip a Budget Committee markup while going straight to the Rules Committee and then the floor. A floor vote on that measure could occur as soon as next Wednesday.
No final decisions have been made, people with knowledge of leaders’ conversations said.
But if the House acts by midweek, it’s possible the Senate could take up the House-adopted resolution next week in time to adopt the same version before the Senate’s impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump begins on Feb. 9.
The 1974 budget law allots up to 50 hours of debate and then a time-consuming amendment “vote-a-rama,” though the majority could yield back some of its 25 hours on the floor to expedite the process.
In separate comments to reporters, Sanders indicated it was possible the Senate might be able to keep working on the budget plan even while the impeachment trial occurs.
“Look, I think Congress is gonna have to show the American people that we can do more than one thing at a time. There was an unprecedented set of crises facing this country, we’ve got to address them,” Sanders said. “We’ve got to work hard. And I would hope and expect that we’re going to move forward aggressively.”
Another possibility was the House could adopt the blueprint first, while inserting a provision in the rule “deeming” the Senate version, expected to be identical, as having been adopted by the House as soon as it comes over from the Senate. Each chamber needs to vote on the same numbered concurrent resolution in order to trigger the reconciliation process.
It wasn’t clear that a final decision had been made to go ahead with the budget blueprint in the Senate next week, but Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin, D-Ill., declined to rule it out. “There are a lot of possibilities,” he said.
Durbin said Democrats are in a rush and he’s giving Republicans “very limited time” to get on board. “We’re facing a national emergency with COVID-19 and the economy. We’ve got to move quickly,” he said. “The president believes that this is a high priority and I agree.”
Durbin cited the March 14 deadline when enhanced unemployment benefits provided in the December aid package run out. Biden wants to increase those benefits from $300 a week to $400 and extend the provisions through September.
Sanders spoke at a press conference to introduce legislation that would increase the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour, which is part of Biden’s rescue plan. He said the measure would pass muster under the so-called Byrd rule, which bars extraneous material unrelated to the federal budget from reconciliation bills.
“I think we absolutely can make the case to the parliamentarian that what we’re doing is consistent with the Byrd rule,” Sanders said, in comments that are at odds with those made by his House counterpart on Monday.
House Budget Chairman John Yarmuth, D-Ky., said it would be “a stretch” for a minimum wage increase to make it through the reconciliation process, but that Democrats would try anyway.
Sanders said the provision would unquestionably reduce deficits by increasing taxable wages and weaning individuals off of benefit programs.
“They’ll be able to stand on their own two feet and not need that public assistance, which means it will have a very positive impact on the federal deficit,” Sanders said. “So that, I think, is one of the major arguments that we will be making.”
Democrats are roughly following a precedent laid down in early 2017 when Republicans who controlled the Senate, House and White House attempted to repeal the 2010 health care law.
In January 2017, the Senate Budget chairman at the time, Michael B. Enzi, R-Wyo., wrote a fiscal 2017 skinny budget resolution with reconciliation instructions with the goal of repealing the law. Instead of the Senate marking up the budget, it was discharged from the committee and went to the floor where the Senate adopted it.
When the Senate budget resolution went to the House, the tax and spending framework skipped the House Budget Committee and went to the Rules Committee, before it was adopted on the House floor.
There is no recent if any precedent for the House originating its own budget resolution without a Budget panel markup, but experts say there’s nothing in the 1974 law that prevents it. And given the House Budget Committee hasn’t even named its members yet for the 117th Congress, it would be a time-consuming step to go through the full markup process at this point.
Once a budget resolution is adopted, House and Senate committees can send the Budget panels their reconciliation recommendations to bundle into a combined package. That measure has a 20-hour Senate time limit, but also has a vote-a-rama process.
Republicans who are part of a group negotiating with the White House are wary that Democrats are signaling they’re ready to blow up bipartisan talks already.
“It’s going to be the White House and the Democrats’ call as to whether they want to work with a bipartisan team to improve the legislation or whether they want to push through a reconciliation, a bill which came with only one party participating,” Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said Tuesday.
Next steps from Democrats on the relief package process will be “a good indication of how the White House intends to work in the future,” added Romney.
