Possibly the first major legislation of the Biden era
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President Joe Biden suggested Monday he was prepared to give Republicans a "couple weeks" to reach a bipartisan deal on a coronavirus aid package before triggering the budget reconciliation process to skirt GOP opposition.
Facing a key governance test in his fledgling presidency, Biden made clear he hoped to rally bipartisan support for his $1.9 trillion pandemic relief plan. But he also held out the prospect of resorting to a more partisan approach: a reconciliation tool that avoids the risk of a Senate filibuster.
“The decision to use reconciliation will depend upon how these negotiations go,” Biden told reporters at the White House. “I don't expect we'll know whether we have an agreement — and to what extent the entire package will be able to pass or not pass — until we get right down to the very end of this process, which will be probably in a couple weeks.”
The president’s comments came one day after his National Economic Council director, Brian Deese, held a conference call with a centrist group of 16 senators from both parties to gauge support for a bipartisan deal. Republicans have expressed unease with the size of Biden’s package and some of its provisions, such as a push to more than double the federal minimum wage.
The White House insisted it was willing to negotiate with Republicans in coming weeks. “We don't expect the final bill to look exactly the same as the first bill he proposed,” spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters at her daily briefing.
What is "budget reconciliation?"
From the House Committee on the Budget: Budget Reconciliation: The Basics.
From Wikipedia: Budget Reconciliation.
Reconciliation is a legislative process of the United States Congress that expedites the passage of certain budgetary legislation in the United States Senate. The Senate filibuster effectively requires a 60-vote super-majority for the passage of most legislation in the Senate, but reconciliation provides a process to prevent the use of the filibuster and thereby allow the passage of a bill with simple majority support in the Senate. The reconciliation procedure also exists in the United States House of Representatives, but reconciliation has had a less significant impact on that body.
Reconciliation bills can be passed on spending, revenue, and the federal debt limit, and the Senate can pass one bill per year affecting each subject. Congress can thus pass a maximum of three reconciliation bills per year, though in practice it has often passed a single reconciliation bill affecting both spending and revenue
