Read on Twitter
A bunch of tweets about budget reconciliation that may be useful:
(1) I don’t see how Democrats use budget reconciliation to do everything they say they want to do without ignoring precedent in a way that would be worse than going nuclear on the filibuster.
(1) I don’t see how Democrats use budget reconciliation to do everything they say they want to do without ignoring precedent in a way that would be worse than going nuclear on the filibuster.
(2) Regardless of whether the bill comes to the Senate floor from the Senate committees or the House, there will be an assessment made about whether that language meets the criteria of reconciliation (its “budgetary” according to the Byrd Rule).
(3) That decision will ultimately be up to the Chair (ie, a Democratic Senator) based on the advice received from the Parliamentarian. In the past, the Parliamentarian has ruled on the preponderance of the provisions included in the bill.
(4) If the provisions are generally budgetary, or could be made budgetary through the floor process, they will determine the bill to be permissible under reconciliation. This allows the Senate to advance to limited debate with only 51 votes.
(5) If they say the bill is not budgetary (or not compliant with Byrd), and the Chair rules that it’s not budgetary (the Chair has always followed the advice of the Parliamentarian), it would take 60 votes to overrule.
In other words, you can’t get on the bill without 60.
In other words, you can’t get on the bill without 60.
(6) But if the Chair ignores the assessment of the Parliamentarian (and says the bill is budgetary), which (again) is something that has never happened on a reconciliation bill, they will be essentially nuking the Byrd rule.
(7) At this point, everything becomes a “reconciliation bill” as long as the Chair agrees. There is no classification between budgetary and non-budgetary. The only appeal against the ruling of the Chair would, ironically, have to clear a 60 vote threshold.
(8) This makes abuse of the budget process the worst of all options. Not only do you turn every bill supported by the majority into “reconciliation” thus subjected to passage with 51 votes under limited debate. But appeals to the contrary could only be undone by a super majority.
(9) The only reason I can see Democrats talking about reconciliation is that it is (obviously) very confusing!
They are in a pickle. They have two Senators who say they are not up for getting rid of the filibuster and a whole lot of folks who want action.
How interesting!
They are in a pickle. They have two Senators who say they are not up for getting rid of the filibuster and a whole lot of folks who want action.
How interesting!
