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- Sanders has expressed confidence that the minimum wage hike will remain in the COVID-19 relief package.
- The parliamentarian of the Senate will determine whether the salary increase can be transmitted by reconciliation.
- Sanders still faces resistance from Democrats Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema.
- Visit Insider’s Business section for more stories.
Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont on Saturday expressed confidence that the proposed hike in the minimum wage to $ 15 an hour will remain in the $ 1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package that Democrats in Congress are targeting to pass through the budget reconciliation process.
President Joe Biden supports raising the minimum wage, but expressed doubts that it would be allowed under the reconciliation rules. But, Sanders, the independent chairman of the Senate Budget Committee who caucuses with Democrats, believes the measure will pass with the Senate parliamentarian.
“Raising the minimum wage to $ 15 an hour is not ‘ancillary’ to the federal budget and is permitted under the rules of reconciliation,” Sanders said in a statement to CNN. CBO [Congressional Budget Office] found that the $ 15 minimum wage has a much bigger impact on the federal budget than opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling and repealing individual tenure penalties – two provisions which the parliamentarian said , did not violate Byrd’s rule when Republicans controlled the Senate. “
He added: “I am confident that the parliamentarian will inform next week that we can raise the minimum wage through the reconciliation process.”
The CBO has ruled that the 2021 wage increase law will have a substantial impact on the budget, which could reach the threshold of Byrd’s rule and go through the reconciliation process.
Sanders insisted that reconciliation – which would rest on the 50 Democratic senators backing the legislation – is the way to raise the minimum wage.
“It will be in reconciliation if I have something to say about it – it’s the only way to get it passed,” he said Joseph Zeballos-Roig from Insider earlier this month.
But even if the parliamentarian decides in favor of Sanders, he will still face resistance from moderate Democrats Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona.
Manchin told The Hill earlier this month he could support raising the minimum wage to $ 11 an hour, which he said was “responsible and reasonable.”
“The minimum wage provision is not appropriate for the reconciliation process,” Sinema told Politico last week. “It’s not a budget item. And there shouldn’t be.”
The federal minimum wage, at $ 7.25 an hour, has been unchanged since July 2009.
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