Senators get set for duration on building bill
Vote expected by Tuesday after holdout’s move
WASHINGTON — A slow-going Senate debate over a broad $550 billion infrastructure package spilled into Sunday and could go on for days yet, with senators resigned to stay as long as it takes to overcome Republican holdouts who want to drag out final votes on one of President Joe Biden’s top priorities.
The bill has won widespread support from senators across the aisle and promises to unleash billions of dollars to upgrade roads, bridges, broadband internet, water pipes and other public works systems undergirding the nation. But a single Republican senator’s protest halted swift passage, forcing the Senate into long day and night sessions toward final votes early Tuesday.
Senators have spent the past week processing nearly two dozen amendments to the 2,700-page package, but so far none has substantially changed its framework.
More amendments could be debated as senators consider revisions to a section on cryptocurrency, a longshot effort by defense hawks to add $50 billion for defense-related infrastructure and a bipartisan amendment to repurpose a portion of the untapped covid-19 relief aid that had been sent to the states.
Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., who helped negotiate the bipartisan proposal, said he expects the package will eventually pass, but suggested that may be two days away unless all 100 senators can agree to speed things up.
“Probably it’s going to pass,” he said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday. “We’ll have a vote tonight at 7:30 and then another vote — if you just look at the clock playing out — sometime on Tuesday. So, it could go quicker, but it’s going.”
Despite the momentum, action ground to a halt over the weekend when Sen. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., an ally of Donald Trump, forced the Senate to run out the clock on debate time, refusing to consent to speeding up the process.
Hagerty, who had been Trump’s ambassador to Japan, was leading the effort to take as much time as needed to debate and amend the bipartisan bill, in part because he wants to slow the march toward Biden’s next big bill, which plans $3.5 trillion for child care, an expansion of Medicare for seniors and other so-called soft infrastructure needs.
“I’m not inclined to expedite this process whatsoever,” Hagerty said on Saturday.
“Democrats’ true intention is to rush this bill through so that they can hurry up and light the fuse on their $3.5 trillion spending spree, a socialist debt bomb, then leave town for vacation,” he said.
Hagerty’s office said he had not spoken to Trump. But the former president has been publicly critical of the bill and criticizing Biden and the senators from both parties who support it, though it’s unclear whether Trump’s broadsides will have much sway with Republican senators.
Majority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., has vowed to keep lawmakers in session, saying the Senate won’t recess for August until progress is made on both bills.
“We’ll keep proceeding until we get this bill done,” Schumer said.
WHAT’S NEXT
The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act would provide what Biden has called a “historic investment” in public works programs, the first part of the president’s rebuilding agenda. Once voting wraps up, senators immediately will turn to the budget outline for a $3.5 trillion package of child care, elder care and other programs that is a much more partisan undertaking and expected to draw only Democratic support.
As many as 20 Republicans are expected to join Democrats in the vote on final passage. Overcoming a 60-vote procedural hurdle Saturday with backing from 18 Republicans was a sign that the tenuous bipartisan alliance could hold on the public works package.
The package passed another procedural vote late Sunday, as senators push toward final passage Monday or early Tuesday. If approved, the bill would go to the House.
“We’re on the cusp of seeing that move through the Senate,” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said on “Fox News Sunday”, citing “a remarkable coalition” that includes business, labor and lawmakers from both parties. “I think we’re about to get this done.”
As the standoff dragged on, Republicans who helped negotiate the compromise spoke up Sunday commending Trump for having sparked infrastructure talks when he was in the White House, even if those bills never panned out.
Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio, the lead Republican negotiator, said improving the nation’s public works systems is long overdue.
“The American people deserve to have good roads and bridges and infrastructure to drive on, travel on,” he said.
Another negotiator, Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, acknowledged that no compromise is perfect, but doing nothing when there was a bill before them was not an option.
“Every president in the modern era has proposed an infrastructure package,” he said. “This was an effort to say, ‘let’s break the logjam.’”
CRYPTOCURRENCY TAX DISPUTE
Senators in both parties were still working to resolve a dispute over two dueling amendments to modify a provision dealing with reporting requirements for cryptocurrency transactions and tax collection. The bipartisan group that drew up the legislation was counting on the extra tax revenue generated to help pay for some of the bill’s costs.
Senate Finance Chairman Ron Wyden, a progressive Democrat, teamed up with conservative Republicans Pat Toomey and Cynthia Lummis in working with the cryptocurrency industry to draft changes to narrow those affected by the reporting requirements. It would exclude entities such as miners, software designers and protocol developers from the groups that need to report data to the Internal Revenue Service.
But Portman and Democrats Kyrsten Sinema and Mark Warner — three key players in negotiating the infrastructure legislation — proposed an eleventh-hour alternative endorsed by the White House. It would target some software companies and cryptocurrency miners.
Toomey said Saturday that the talks weren’t immediately fruitful.
“I don’t know how it’s going to work out. We’re working on it,” the Pennsylvania Republican said.
Meanwhile, Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn is pressing for the Senate to vote on his amendment that would allow state and local governments to use as much as 30% of their unspent covid relief funds on infrastructure projects. Cornyn said his proposal, sponsored with Democratic Senator Alex Padilla, could free up between $80 billion and $100 billion for projects.
He pleaded with other senators on Saturday to allow consent needed to vote on the proposal considered “non-germane” under Senate rules.
“This money is readily available and does not add to the deficit or debt, but merely provides them with flexibility,” Cornyn said.
INTERSTATE MOMENT?
Biden, who was spending the weekend in Delaware, said the bipartisan package offers an investment on par with the building of the transcontinental railroad or interstate highway system.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has so far allowed the bill to progress, despite Trump objections. “This is a compromise,” McConnell said Saturday.
Senators have found much to like in the bill, even though it does not fully satisfy liberals, who view it as too small, or conservatives, who find it too large. It would provide federal money for projects many states and cities could not afford on their own.
An analysis of the bill from the Congressional Budget Office drew concerns, particularly from Republicans. It concluded that the legislation would increase deficits by about $256 billion over the next decade.
But the bill’s backers argued that the budget office was unable to take into account certain revenue streams — including from future economic growth. Additional analysis released Saturday by the budget office suggested infrastructure spending overall could boost productivity and lower the ultimate costs.
Paying for the package has been a pressure point throughout the months of negotiations after Democrats objected to an increase in the gas tax paid at the pump and Republicans resisted a plan to bolster the IRS to go after tax scofflaws.
Unlike Biden’s bigger $3.5 trillion package, which would be paid for by higher tax rates for corporations and the wealthy, the bipartisan package is funded by repurposing other money, including untapped covid-19 aid, and other spending cuts and revenue streams.
The legislation still faces challenges in the House, where Democrats can afford only three defectors if Republicans vote in unison against the bill. Speaker Nancy Pelosi reaffirmed Friday that the House won’t take up the infrastructure legislation until the Senate also passes the more sweeping economic package, a linkage demanded by progressives in the chamber. That is a central demand of progressive Democrats in the House, but some moderates are urging Pelosi to not delay the infrastructure bill.
The House is in recess and is expected to consider both Biden infrastructure packages when it returns in September.
As many as 20 Republicans are expected to join Democrats in the vote on final passage. Overcoming a 60-vote procedural hurdle Saturday with backing from 18 Republicans was a sign that the tenuous bipartisan alliance could hold on the public works package.