Lauren Moye, FISM News
Congress faces a different kind of holiday rush as they plan for an extended session with a blistering and ambitious schedule to accomplish before Christmas. Republicans and Democrats are still set to face off over Biden’s Build Back Better plan, the defense bill, and mandatory vaccine mandates.
While both legislative bodies were scheduled to end their sessions on Dec. 10, the House has formally extended their session to Dec. 20. Senate has warned they might work up until Christmas, which is the goal date that Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has set for the Senate to pass the social and climate spending plan under the umbrella of a budget reconciliation.
The bill, which has already been gutted to $1.9 trillion from its original $3.5 trillion price tag, still hasn’t gained the committed approval of Democratic senators Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and Krysten Sinema (Ariz.). Since the bill has no Republican support in a body divided 50-50 along party lines, it will fail if just one of the holdouts votes no.
“Debt and inflation are a big concern for me,” Manchin told CNN on Thursday. “Basically we should pay for what we’re doing.”
Manchin also stated that he wouldn’t “have any idea how I’m going to vote until I walk in” if Schumer were to put the bill to a vote.
Parts of the Build Back Better legislation are also endangered by Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, who has yet to issue her final judgment on what parts of the legislation fit under the rules of budget reconciliation. The Senate’s continued meetings with the parliamentarian are expected to consume some of their time to accomplish the remaining legislative goals before they break for Christmas.
While Congress passed another stop-gap resolution to fund the government through mid-February, both Houses still need to come to an agreement on the National Defense Authorization Act. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer listed the bill on the voting schedule for this week, signaling that an informal deal may be close to being finalized.
The defense bill was held up recently by Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who has withdrawn support of other bill amendments until Democrats agree to include a ban on imports from China’s Xinjiang’s region. As FISM previously reported, The Xinjiang region is “where the Chinese government has been imprisoning the Uyghur minority group in slave labor camps and committing genocide against them.”
Democrats officially rejected Rubio’s amendment on Dec. 1, citing a procedural problem called “blue-slipping” that requires revenue-producing legislation to begin in the House. The defense bill is expected to pass a final deal this week, which will need at least 10 Republican votes in the Senate.
Republicans also have a big goal of their own to meet before the Christmas break as legislation that would end Biden’s mandatory vaccine mandate is on the table. Issued through a ruling by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), Biden’s mandate would impact two-thirds of the U.S. workforce and would go into effect on Jan. 4 if a court ruling currently blocking it were overturned. A group of Republicans recently tried and failed to remove funding for the mandate as part of a deal on the government funding bill.
However, conservative Senators, thanks to the support of West Virginia’s Manchin, are now ready to force a vote through the Congressional Review Act that would officially legislate against OSHA’s rule.
“I do not support any government vaccine mandate on private businesses. …I have long said we should incentivize, not penalize, private employers whose responsibility it is to protect their employees from COVID-19,” Manchin said.
Although the Senate appears to have enough votes to force the issue, the bill is not likely to pass in the House where Democrats hold a larger majority.