Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., reportedly believes he’s found a legislative loophole that will allow Democrats to pass another party-line mega bill through the Senate.
Though there’s no final decision on the unusual strategy to squeeze an extra reconciliation bill into this fiscal year, Senate Democrats — who don’t think any significant bill requiring 60 votes would pass the upper chamber — appear to want to push the boundaries of what can be accomplished through reconciliation, Politico reported Monday.
According to parliamentary rules, budget reconciliation can only be used to pass legislation through the Senate with just a simple majority of 51 votes — rather than the 60 it takes to overcome a filibuster — once every fiscal year, according to Politico.
But Democrats have already pressed their luck once and come out winners.
Because Congress didn’t pass a budget resolution last year, Democrats used reconciliation left over from fiscal year 2021 to pass President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan. That means Democrats have fiscal year 2022 reconciliation remaining as a vehicle to pass portions of Biden’s infrastructure, tax, climate, and social welfare agenda, Politico noted.
But Schumer thinks buried in the rules of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 is a parliamentary way to unlock a third reconciliation bill that could be used this year.
"Recently, top policy aides to Majority Leader Schumer made the argument to the Senate Parliamentarian that Section 304 allows for at least one additional set of reconciliation bills related to revenue, spending and the public debt to be considered for Fiscal Year 2021," an unnamed Schumer aide told Politico.
The potential use of reconciliation for yet another bill would also be an alternative to ending the filibuster, a divisive issue that doesn't yet have the Senate votes to move forward.
If the reconciliation plan gets a green light from Democrats, the Senate parliamentarian will again wield enormous power — just like she did over the debate about whether a minimum wage increase was eligible for inclusion in the last reconciliation bill, Politico reported.
As long as the filibuster remains as a roadblock to progressive bills in the Senate, the White House has sounded support for getting its agenda through by any strategy necessary, The Hill has previously reported.
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