“The Republican plan adds about $2 trillion to the debt,” Senator Rand Paul explained at the beginning of the month, referring to the Continuing Resolution (CR) which remains, to this day, unresolved. “I’m opposed to deficit spending,” he added, insisting that he would “vote for something with less deficit, but not a $2 trillion deficit.”
Most of the shutdown screaming blames President Donald Trump, but Trump’s a big advocate for the CR. Trouble is, it requires a 60 percent Yea vote in the Senate. All but three Democrats voting Nay ensure that the CR will continue to fail.
So, Sen. Paul’s continuing Nay vote isn’t the cause really; a switch on his part wouldn’t allow the bill to pass. The folks worried about losing their SNAP benefits (just about the only Americans not in government who’ve noticed the shutdown) shouldn’t blame anyone other than those nay-saying Democrats.
From the beginning, Paul has noted a different irony — his alignment with the bulk of Democrats in opposing the CR. He’s against its continuation of old spending expectations; Democrats, on the other hand, demand even more, especially securing the renewal of Obamacare subsidies.
While the CR failed a 13th time, yesterday, Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D‑Ct.) said that lawmakers had set aside a USDA contingency fund “for exactly these kinds of purposes” — that is, to fund SNAP during the shutdown. The White House insists it lacks legal authorization for this, and, besides, November’s food subsidy requires $9 billion, and the fund falls short by four.
It appears that the tens of millions who may not get their EBT cards filled at the beginning of November remain unaware of what the battle is really about.
But they may be getting a clue: it’s not about them.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
Illustration created with Krea and Firefly
See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)
See recent popular posts
4 replies on “Blame Rand Paul?”
The game of chicken here is very interesting. The Democrats can, of course, give the Continuing Resolution the necessary votes to get to sixty. Or the Republicans can exercise what is called “the nuclear option”, and first vote to allow such bills to pass by a simple majority, and then vote for the Continuing Resolution.
Sooo… why aren’t the Republicans doing just that? Well, one reason is that Republicans know that they would miss super-majority requirements if-and-when the Republicans are again in the minority.
But, once the requirement of super-majorities is abolished for Continuing Resolutions, a natural question will be of why such a requirement should hold for a budget proper. Infamously, the last time that a full budget was passed was in 1997. Moreover, a propensity for log-rolling is greater when super-majorities are required within a group still small enough for deal-making.
If the Republicans pull the trigger, then they will own any failure to pass a proper budget; they will own any budget that is passed; and they will own any deficits,whether from a Continuing Resolution or from a full budget. And, frankly, we know that most of the Republicans don’t want to own such things.
Nor, for that matter, do the Democrats; but they have a base still more eager to see money spent and still more tolerant both of overt taxes and of deficit spending.
The real game of chicken is not about each party fearing backlash over lost services and benefits; the real game of chicken is about ownership of the budget.
“Trouble is, it requires a 60 percent Yea vote in the Senate.”
No, it doesn’t.
The Republicans have already used the “nuclear option” — a rules change to pass by majority with no need for 60-vote cloture — as recently as this year (to confirm Trump nominees). They can do that again any time they please.
The Republicans control the House, the Senate, and the White House. If the government is “shut down,” it’s because the GOP wants it “shut down,” and it will be un-“shut” whenever the GOP decides it wants that to happen.
The change in the cloture vote was for nominees, not for legislation. Otherwise the CR would have been passed by October 1. The only other way to pass legislation by a simple majority in the Senate is thru the reconciliation process, which was used to pass the BBB.
You don’t need a sixty-vote majority to pass legislation. The supermajority is needed to shut down debate and allow the bill to be voted up or down. If every bill needed sixty yes votes then there would be no need for the VP to break a tie, ever. Democrats are preventing what Republicans allowed them to do thirteen times under Joe Biden: pass a clean continuing resolution. To all Democrat senators whose states have large numbers of federal workers and/or whose constituents are paying for your intransigence: why are you doing this?