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A few key Senate Democrats appear unwilling to end the legislative filibuster, leaving most of President Biden’s legislative priorities at the limit of probabilities. But Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (DN.Y.) thinks he may have found “a magic parliamentary trick” to get Democrats at least one more legislative victory in the Senate 50-50, Politico reports. This is a budget reconciliation and an obscure section of the 1974 Congressional Budget Act.
“If you know one thing about the obscure subject of fiscal reconciliation, it’s that it can be used to pass a law through the Senate with only 51 votes” and “if you know two things, that’s the rule of thumb. simple majority and this reconciliation can only be used once per fiscal year, ” Politico Explain. Democrats have passed their $ 1.9 trillion stimulus package in the unused 2021 budget, which means they can use reconciliation once again this year, with the 2022 budget.
But if the Senate parliamentarian agrees with Schumer’s interpretation of section 304 of the 1974 finance law, Democrats can amend last year’s budget to pass more laws through reconciliation. “It is not known how many more opportunities for reconciliation this theory would open”, Axios reports, but that would add at least one more shot to sidestep the filibuster this year alone.
“No final decision has been taken on legislative strategy,” said a Schumer employee. Axios. “Schumer wants to maximize his options to allow Senate Democrats multiple avenues to advance President Biden’s Build Back Better agenda.”
If Democrats pursue the Section 304 strategy, “the parliamentarian in the Senate will again be the most powerful person in Washington,” Politico reports. “It goes without saying that this is a bizarre way to govern. No one would conceive of a system like this, where even popular laws are passed, Senators seek to play a rocky budgeting process and the most Hill’s major players are now the experts on these obscure rules. devised in 1974 for the purpose of deficit reduction. “You can read the relevant part of Section 304 at Politico.
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