DEBATE ON CLIMATE CHANGE LEGISLATION COOLS IN
SENATE
Debate ended Friday on the Lieberman Warner climate change bill (S. 3036) without a vote in the Senate. While few experts thought the bill would be brought to a vote in this Congress, what little debate that did take place was hardly seen as constructive.
The debate on the bill started off strongly on Tuesday, however it was brought to a standstill on Wednesday as Senate Republicans used a parliamentary tactic to require the Senate clerk to read the entire five page bill as a protest against the Democratic leadership's refusal to consider the Administration's judicial nominations. The procedure consumed valuable floor time and ground debate to a halt.
Republicans also protested Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's (D-NV) plan to limit the number of amendments to five by both parties. Republicans wanted to offer more and pointed that 160 amendments were offered after five weeks of debate on Congress' last major climate legislation: the 1990 Clean Air Act.
The shortened debate prevents
observers from knowing how individual Senators feel about
climate change in general and about the specific amendments.
It is expected that the bill will return to the Senate in the
next Congress.
FARM BILL RE-PASSED BY SENATE
The missing title to the farm bill was approved this week. The Senate voted 77-15 on Thursday to re-adopt the whole farm bill to cover the missing title. Currently, 14 titles of the farm bill have been enacted into law, except for Title III which covers trade and international food assistance. The trade title was accidentally left out of the bill version vetoed by the President and then overridden by Congress in May. In a largely symbolic gesture President Bush is expected to veto the farm bill again.
CONGRESS FINISHES FY 2009 BUDGET; BEGINS APPROPRIATIONS PROCESS
Last week both chambers of Congress adopted the FY09 budget. The Senate adopted the conference report on a 48-45 vote; the House vote was 214 to 210. The $3 trillion budget covers the federal government for fiscal year 2009, and would appropriate $24 billion more than the President’s request of $991 billion in discretionary spending.
Overall, the FY09 budget does not delve into the really difficult spending and tax cut matters; Congress has opted to postpone those debates and decisions until the next administration. Now that the budget has been adopted Congress can officially move on to the appropriations process.
With the budget complete, appropriators can now turn their attention to the 12 spending bills. A schedule of subcommittee/committee mark-ups was released last week by House appropriators. The Senate is expected to begin their mark-ups the week of June 16. The general consensus remains that few of these bills will be completed or sent to President Bush.
DEMOCRATS FIGHT AMONGST THEMSELVES OVER WAR SUPPLEMENTAL DETAILS
Democratic leaders are trying to satisfy the competing interests within their party. The “Blue Dog” Democrats still want the expanded GI education benefits to be offset (something the Senate rejected) and have hinted that they (a block of 49 members) may vote against the procedural rule for the bill’s consideration.
In all, House Democratic leaders are hoping to keep the war measure as “clean” as possible. Their aim is to keep the war funding close to the amount requested by the President, strip-out most domestic spending items, and have the GI education benefits be the only major attachment. As such, it looks possible that the extended 13 weeks of unemployment benefits may be taken out, and instead of blocking seven Medicaid rules, only four will be blocked. But Senate Democrats are demanding that those very provisions be retained.
TAX EXTENDERS FACE UPHILL BATTLE
It was anticipated that the Senate Finance Committee, under Chairman Baucus, would soon mark-up their version of the tax extenders bill. But it now looks as though committee consideration will be by-passed and that the extenders bill will head directly to the Senate floor this week.
It was unclear if the Senate’s version
would be similar to the House-passed version (H.R. 6049), or if the
Senate would simply take up the House bill. The House’s version extends
popular renewable energy tax credits. The move to
forgo committee consideration has upset Republicans and that dynamic
could make floor consideration of the bill more difficult.
AMTRAK TRANSPORTATION LEGISLATION ON TRACK FOR PASSAGE
This week, the House will consider a five-year, $14.4
billion reauthorization of Amtrak. The bill, H.R. 6003, includes $4.2
billion for capital grants and $3 billion for operations. The measure
also authorizes $2.5 billion for states to add or improve intercity
passenger service. The House version also allocates funds for a
high-speed rail project from New York City to Washington, D.C.
that private companies could bid on. The Senate’s version of the Amtrak
measure (S. 294)
is similar but does not include the high-speed rail project. The
Senate adopted the legislation in October 2007 and would authorize
Amtrak at $11.4 billion.
SENATE TO ADDRESS OIL PRICES
The Senate is expected to take up legislation
(S.3044) designed to alleviate high gas prices and supply shortfalls.
The legislation would impose a "windfall" profit tax on oil companies
and redirect those funds to research and development of renewable energy
technology. The bill, sponsored by Senator Harry Reid (D-NV), also
seeks to eliminate price gouging and hold energy companies responsible
for high gas prices.
