Speaker Nancy Pelosi is ready to be done with anything having to do anything with infrastructure, and who can blame her? One bill done, dusted, and signed, she’s ready to get the next one out of there. That means it’s threat-making time for her caucus. Do your work or you don’t get to have recess. It always works better on holidays, too.
Chances are very good that they will be done with work on President Joe Biden’s very popular Build Back Better (BBB) Act in plenty of time to get home for Thanksgiving. That’s the human infrastructure part of his big jobs and family agenda: a bill that addresses climate change, provides expanded support for families with universal pre-K and paid family leave, and continues popular programs from the American Rescue plan including monthly Child Tax Credit payments of up to $300 per child, and more affordable health care coverage under the Affordable Care Act.
But the fact that they don’t want to screw up this time off could be what’s making everyone in the House play nice this week—even the problem children in the Sabotage Squad. It appears that the hard work Rep. Pramila Jayapal and other members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus did with conservative Democrats to find a compromise that allowed them to advance BBB and pass the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act did break up some logjams.
“I think people want to get it done before the week’s over,” Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas, one of the conservatives who’s been pushing back on BBB, told Politico. “There’s still some things I don’t like, but we’re going to look at it and then take it from there.” One of the conservative Democrats’ ring leaders, Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, was also sounding conciliatory. “My full expectation based on what the White House told us, what Treasury told us, is that it will meet our expectations,” he said.
He’s talking about the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) upcoming full score of the bill, something the conservatives insisted on getting this week before they would vote for BBB. That’s probably going to happen, the CBO says. It has completed estimates on about half of the bill’s individual titles, with five more expected on Friday at the latest.
The White House is being cautious on the expectations of the CBO score when it comes to revenue, telling Politico that the “CBO’s analysis won’t necessarily show the bill is fully paid for, in part because of the way CBO tallies the savings from a huge IRS policy provision.” The CBO will probably say around $200 billion, the White House estimates $400 billion. “So far, so good,” Pelosi said of the CBO’s scoring, saying she thinks the report will show it’s fully paid for.
Then there’s the Senate. More specifically, there’s Sen. Joe Manchin, the Democrat from West Virginia who is truly relishing the limelight of playing spoiler. The House is working to make sure everything they put in the bill can pass muster under budget reconciliation rules, the process that will let the bill pass with just Democratic votes. That will give them one more advantage in winning over Manchin, if he decides to start playing nice and stop delaying.
Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is nonetheless pushing. He said early Tuesday that his goal is having BBB done before Christmas. Manchin hemmed and hawed about that, saying he has “a lot of concerns” with that plan. Schumer, however, came back in his press conference Tuesday afternoon, and is sticking to that timeframe.
Chances are very good that they will be done with work on President Joe Biden’s very popular Build Back Better (BBB) Act in plenty of time to get home for Thanksgiving. That’s the human infrastructure part of his big jobs and family agenda: a bill that addresses climate change, provides expanded support for families with universal pre-K and paid family leave, and continues popular programs from the American Rescue plan including monthly Child Tax Credit payments of up to $300 per child, and more affordable health care coverage under the Affordable Care Act.
But the fact that they don’t want to screw up this time off could be what’s making everyone in the House play nice this week—even the problem children in the Sabotage Squad. It appears that the hard work Rep. Pramila Jayapal and other members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus did with conservative Democrats to find a compromise that allowed them to advance BBB and pass the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act did break up some logjams.
“I think people want to get it done before the week’s over,” Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas, one of the conservatives who’s been pushing back on BBB, told Politico. “There’s still some things I don’t like, but we’re going to look at it and then take it from there.” One of the conservative Democrats’ ring leaders, Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, was also sounding conciliatory. “My full expectation based on what the White House told us, what Treasury told us, is that it will meet our expectations,” he said.
He’s talking about the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) upcoming full score of the bill, something the conservatives insisted on getting this week before they would vote for BBB. That’s probably going to happen, the CBO says. It has completed estimates on about half of the bill’s individual titles, with five more expected on Friday at the latest.
The White House is being cautious on the expectations of the CBO score when it comes to revenue, telling Politico that the “CBO’s analysis won’t necessarily show the bill is fully paid for, in part because of the way CBO tallies the savings from a huge IRS policy provision.” The CBO will probably say around $200 billion, the White House estimates $400 billion. “So far, so good,” Pelosi said of the CBO’s scoring, saying she thinks the report will show it’s fully paid for.
Then there’s the Senate. More specifically, there’s Sen. Joe Manchin, the Democrat from West Virginia who is truly relishing the limelight of playing spoiler. The House is working to make sure everything they put in the bill can pass muster under budget reconciliation rules, the process that will let the bill pass with just Democratic votes. That will give them one more advantage in winning over Manchin, if he decides to start playing nice and stop delaying.
Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is nonetheless pushing. He said early Tuesday that his goal is having BBB done before Christmas. Manchin hemmed and hawed about that, saying he has “a lot of concerns” with that plan. Schumer, however, came back in his press conference Tuesday afternoon, and is sticking to that timeframe.