Republicans in the Senate are ready to force Democrats to vote on a series of potentially uncomfortable issues, including paying illegal immigrants.
Fox News reported GOP senators are set to take advantage of the rules of the budget reconciliation process that Democrats are using to advance President Joe Biden’s COVID-19 stimulus package.
The debate on the budget resolution is expected to end on Thursday afternoon. The news network noted after that a process called vote-a-rama will begin.
At that time, any senator can file an amendment to the resolution. And it could wind up resulting in dozens of votes on various provisions going late into the night.
Fox News said Republicans plan to use the vote-a-rama as a way to punish Democrats for using reconciliation to push ahead the stimulus package
"The new president talks a lot about unity, but his White House staff and congressional leadership are working from the opposite playbook," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said of the budget reconciliation process. “Senate Republicans will be ready and waiting with a host of amendments to improve the rushed procedural step that’s being jammed through."
"We’ll be getting senators on the record about whether taxpayers should fund checks for illegal immigrants … whether Democrats should raise taxes on small businesses in the midst of this historic crisis … and whether generous federal funding should pour into school districts where the unions refuse to let schools open.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., had said reconciliation is open to GOP participation and that the stimulus bill can still be tweaked with their input. But he said Democrats won’t risk moving slowly or timidly to strengthen the economy.
Jeffrey Rodack ✉
Jeffrey Rodack, who has nearly a half century in news as a senior editor and city editor for national and local publications, has covered politics for Newsmax for nearly seven years.
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