The House remains in a committee work week. In activity of note today, the House Appropriations Committee will mark up the FY2022 Homeland and Defense Subcommittee Appropriations Bills and the Energy and Commerce Committee will hold a member day hearing.
The Senate reconvened at 10 a.m. and will resume consideration of the nomination of Uzra Zeya to be an Under Secretary of State for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights and the nomination of Julie A. Su to be Deputy Secretary of Labor.
Senate Democrats say they are close to a deal on a budget resolution that will pave the way for them to pass a sweeping, multitrillion-dollar infrastructure bill this fall. Democratic senators are vowing to vote during this work period, tentatively scheduled to last through the first week of August, on both the budget resolution that greenlights reconciliation and the smaller bipartisan deal that would spend $1.2 trillion over eight years on infrastructure. Budget Committee Democrats huddled late into the night Monday with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, (D-New York), Brian Deese, National Economic Council director, and Louisa Terrell, White House legislative affairs director, to discuss the budget reconciliation package they plan to use to enact most of President Joe Biden’s economic proposals. The meeting led by Schumer and Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont), the chairman of the Budget Committee, lasted roughly two hours after Sanders met with President Joe Biden earlier in the day. Senators leaving the meeting just after 9 p.m. Monday said the group plans to meet again Tuesday evening as they work to finalize an agreement on the spending and revenue targets. Once an agreement is reached on spending and revenue targets, the figures would be turned into instructions to various committees to flesh out into implementing legislation for Biden’s climate change and “care economy” plans. However, this morning, Senator Joe Manchin (D-West Virginia) warned that he wants both the bipartisan infrastructure bill and a separate Democratic-only bill to be fully paid for which will complicate the process.
Meanwhile, the smaller bipartisan deal that would spend $1.2 trillion over eight years on infrastructure assembled by members of the bipartisan group, which now totals 22, are working to turn their proposal into legislative text. Democrats could bring that measure to the floor as soon as next week, though there’s skepticism that the group will finish by then. After two weeks away during the July Fourth recess, the bipartisan group is expected to meet again Tuesday, which members say will be an opportunity to try to iron out key details of the bill and give them a chance to attempt to come back together after the group’s unity was tested in recent weeks.
President Joe Biden will travel to Philadelphia today to deliver an address about the actions his administration is taking to “protect the sacred constitutional right to vote.” The speech comes amid a mostly Republican-led push in numerous states, including Georgia, Florida and Texas, to enact voting rules changes that critics call restrictive and discriminatory. The president on Thursday met with leading civil rights groups on the issue. The same day, Vice President Kamala Harris announced that the Democratic National Committee would invest $25 million to expand its get-out-the-vote efforts for the upcoming midterm elections. In his speech, Mr. Biden is expected to outline all of the ways his administration is working to further voting access. He is expected to highlight the vice president’s efforts to support voter registration and education. He will likely reinforce the idea that the current crop of Republican statehouse efforts meant to restrict voting access were inspired by a lie that voter fraud upset the 2020 election.
Adam S. Olsen, Washington, D.C.
