Tag: bills
McConnell Vows To Kill 395 Bills Passed By House

McConnell Vows To Kill 395 Bills Passed By House

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell confirmed on Thursday that he is blocking about 400 pieces of legislation that have passed the House of Representatives, and made it clear that he intends to kill every one of them.

Speaking to Fox News, McConnell (R-KY), the self-proclaimed “Grim Reaper,” confirmed that he was holding up 395 pieces of legislation, which does not take into account the growing pile of bills that have made it to his desk since the start of the new year.

“It is true. They’ve been on full left-wing parade over there, trotting out all of their left-wing solutions that are going to be issues in the fall campaign,” McConnell replied. “We’re not gonna pass those.”

He admitted that there were “some things we can agree on” such as “infrastructure” and “parks.”

“It may not be a big bill, because that would require dealing with the revenue sources [and] both sides are nervous about raising the gas tax,” he said, referring to a potential infrastructure deal.

He added, “It’s not that we’re not doing anything. It’s that we’re not doing what the House Democrats and these candidates for president on the Democratic ticket want to do.”

When asked about a House-passed bill to lower drug prices, something Republicans have claimed is a priority, McConnell said simply the Senate was “wrestling with that.”

Since the start of 2019, McConnell and Senate Republican caucus have done almost no legislating. The vast majority of their 428 roll call votes last year were related to Donald Trump’s nominees to the courts or executive branch. Even several members of McConnell’s own caucus have criticized their leadership for focusing almost solely on nominations.

Some of the legislation McConnell is obstructing is indeed based on progressive ideas that he opposes, though most received at least some GOP votes in the House. These include bills to provide voter protections, prohibit discrimination against LGBTQ Americans, protect Dreamers, guarantee fair pay, mandate gun background checks, fight government corruption, and raise the federal minimum wage.

But many of the stalled measures are fairly non-controversial bills that easily passed the House, with overwhelming bipartisan support. Often, these bills were even authored by House Republicans.

They include:

  • The Global Hope Act, a bipartisan bill by Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX) to support global partnerships for the fight against childhood cancer. It passed with super-majority House support last month.
  • The Securing America’s Ports Act, a bipartisan bill by Rep. Xochitl Torres Small (D-NM) to ensure that all vehicles entering the United States at land ports of entry are scanned. It passed with super-majority House support this week.
  • The Unlocking Opportunities for Small Businesses Act, a bill by Rep. Jim Hagedorn (R-MN) and Dwight Evans (D-PA) to make it easier for small business to compete for federal prime contracts by requiring contract officers to consider relevant past performance and subcontractor experience of companies. It passed with super-majority House support last month.
  • H.R. 5037, a bill to rename the Farmville, North Carolina, post office after the late Rep. Walter Jones Jr. (R-NC). Jones’ successor, Reg. Gregory Murphy (R-NC), authored the bill and every member of the state’s House delegation co-sponsored the tribute to the 12-term GOP lawmaker. It passed with super-majority House support last week.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.

Quiet Win For Boehner? Bending The Entitlement Curve

Quiet Win For Boehner? Bending The Entitlement Curve

By Matt Fuller, CQ-Roll Call (TNS)

WASHINGTON — If the phrase “sustainable growth rate” sounds like it might be useful in putting you to sleep, you might have missed it.

Speaker John A. Boehner (R-OH) is quietly putting the finishing touches on a legacy item, a legislative accomplishment Hollywood is obsessed with and high school civics teachers insist is the third rail of politics: “entitlement reform.”

It’s no accident most Americans haven’t heard much about a potential deal eliminating SGR and making changes to Medicare. A long-term bill is still in question, and final details are still being hammered out. But every day there isn’t an uprising on SGR is a day closer to a deal.

It looks increasingly likely lawmakers will agree to ditch the yearly fixes to the payment formula for Medicare doctors and pay for it — at least some of it — by making changes to private Medigap plans and by forcing wealthier seniors to pay more.

“In budget after budget, Republicans have offered real, structural reforms to strengthen the Medicare program for seniors,” Boehner said in a statement to CQ Roll Call on Wednesday. “This is an important opportunity to start getting some of those reforms enacted into law for the benefit of generations to come.”

Close Boehner-ally and fellow Ohio Republican Pat Tiberi told CQ Roll Call Boehner has always wanted to accomplish “big things.”

“This framework would certainly fall into that category,” Tiberi said. “Speaker Boehner has made entitlement reform a priority over the years because he knows it would have the largest impact on solving our long-term fiscal problems. If the framework of this deal is enacted, Speaker Boehner would and should consider it a major win for taxpayers.”

Yes, Boehner has long argued for an entitlement overhaul. He’s been talking about it since he came to Congress in 1991. And it was a major part of his campaign to be majority leader in 2006. And yet there really hasn’t been much movement on the issue since the ’90s, when Congress passed a welfare overhaul in 1996 and the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. That’s how difficult the issue is.

Of course, the “fixes” being discussed now aren’t the most ambitious changes ever. But they are “changes” adjacent to the word “Medicare.” Sources close to the negotiations say most of the real savings would come from lowering income thresholds for aspects of Medicare that are already means-tested, such as prescriptions and doctor visits, or by increasing the percentage that these wealthier seniors have to pay for their premiums. Currently, means-testing on Medicare kicks in at $85,000 per year for individuals and $170,000 for couples.

Democrats in recent years have insisted any real changes to entitlements be coupled with tax hikes, but they’ve dropped that demand with SGR. And that could be a breakthrough for future negotiations.

Such negotiations aren’t likely to happen while Boehner is speaker. And, of course, this deal could fall apart. But GOP leadership is pushing the yet-to-be-released bill as a win for conservatives, particularly when the long-term savings are considered. Leadership acknowledges the deal would add to the deficit over the next ten years. But proponents say skeptics should look further out and measure the proposal’s long-term savings against the fact that Congress typically doesn’t pay for SGR anyway.

Democrats have stayed mostly silent on the negotiations. Boehner and Ways and Means Chairman Paul D. Ryan (R-WI) told the GOP Conference Tuesday they’d been working with Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) to jam the Senate into taking the House-passed bill.

That bipartisan angle may be part of the problem for conservatives, who would prefer Boehner try to pass legislation with all Republican votes before consulting Democrats.

“He was sitting down with Nancy first,” Representative Tim Huelskamp (R-KA), said of Boehner Tuesday, “and then he’s going to come back to conference and say, ‘Hey, we got the votes. I’m going to ram it through, and together, we’re going to jam the Senate.’

“No, it’s to jam the House Republican conservatives.”

Huelskamp predicted a majority of the GOP conference wouldn’t vote for the long-term deal. “But if he’s got Pelosi and her crowd, and he’s got 30 of the Tuesday group, he’s got her done,” he said.

Expect a lot more than 30 Republicans to vote for a deal. The doctor’s lobby has been all over Congress on this issue, hitting up Republicans and Democrats. And even some of the most conservative voices in the House see merit to a long-term deal.

“This is one that I’m going to take the leap of faith,” conservative Arizona Republican Paul Gosar told CQ Roll Call. “We got to do something.”

If Gosar is in, plenty more conservatives — not to mention rank and file — could join him.

“Democrats aren’t stupid,” Heritage Action Communications Director Dan Holler told CQ Roll Call in an email. “If they’re in on the deal, it is because it serves their long-term interests. Heck, a Democrat leadership aide is touting this as a ‘very big accomplishment’ for the minority!”

Holler went on to say that if Republicans wanted to vote for $130 billion in new deficit spending, that was their decision. “But they shouldn’t pretend they’ll be sneaking something by Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid (D-NV), and Barack Obama,” he said.

Indeed, Democrats could be waiting until the bill is passed before sending out a round of self-congratulatory news releases. Most of these changes were included in President Barack Obama’s own budget. And even the changes that could affect less wealthy seniors, such as alterations to the supplemental coverage of Medigap, are pretty modest. Negotiators are discussing having seniors pay a deductible of less than $250 before their coverage kicks in. But the more significant changes — at least from a pay-for perspective — are the means-testing provisions.

With years before many of those changes ever take hold, Democrats could be paying for the so-called “doc fix” for free if they’re able to undo the modifications — or just delay them until Congress becomes accustomed to the idea of not doing it.

Sort of like what happened with SGR in the first place.

As Congress Returns To Work, Politics Is High On The Agenda

As Congress Returns To Work, Politics Is High On The Agenda

By William Douglas, McClatchy Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON — Congress returned Monday for a two-week session with a schedule that’s short on substantive action and long on political theater ahead of November’s midterm elections.

Rather than go out in a blaze of legislative accomplishment before the Nov. 4 elections, members of the House of Representatives and the Senate appear satisfied with doing the bare minimum required before returning to their districts to campaign.

Keeping the federal government operating beyond Sept. 30, extending or shutting an agency that helps U.S. businesses sell their products overseas, and whether to formally weigh in on the recent violent activities of the Islamic State top the agenda.

After that, the Democratic-controlled Senate and the Republican-run House will conduct a series of votes and debates designed more to appeal to each party’s political base than to become law.

For example, the Senate was scheduled to vote Monday on a Democratic-sponsored measure to consider a constitutional amendment on the nation’s campaign finance laws, a nonstarter among Republicans.

House Republicans are slated to fold their previously passed jobs measures into one bill and put it up to a vote during the two-week session. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California told fellow Republicans last week that the vote is designed “to remind (Senate Majority Leader) Harry Reid of our positive solutions and foster job creation.”

“Do a quick kick and get out of town,” said Robert Bixby, the executive director of the Concord Coalition, a nonpartisan government-watchdog group. “This has kind of become the new regular order. It’s not a good thing, but it’s better than a shutdown.”

As early as this week, lawmakers will vote on a short-term continuing resolution to fund the government past the Sept. 30 end of the fiscal year and avoid a repeat of last October’s 16-day partial government shutdown.

The measure once again signifies the failure of Democrats and Republicans in the two chambers to reach consensus on serious budgetary issues and punts the responsibility of passing a budget into the hands of a post-election lame-duck Congress — or even a new Congress in 2015.

Though the resolution is expected to pass, there might be some problems along the way. One of them could be the federal Export-Import Bank, which would run out of funding if Congress fails to reauthorize it by Sept. 30.

The bank is the bane of conservatives, who consider it a testament to “crony capitalism” and a heavy-handed institution that picks business winners and losers.

There’s bipartisan support for the bank among Democratic and Republican leaders, though they disagree on the length of the reauthorization.

With House members and senators assembled in Washington for the first time since late July, both chambers are expected to discuss the deteriorating situation in the Middle East and the deadly rise of the Islamic State.

But it’s unclear whether lawmakers will do anything more than talk and hold hearings such as the Sept. 16 House Foreign Affairs Committee session on the Islamic State, in which Secretary of State John Kerry is scheduled to testify.

AFP Photo/Michael Mathes

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