(RepublicanInformer.com)- Democrats in the House were able to overcome a standoff between the party’s leaders and some of its moderate members.
Now, the party will move forward with procedures to introduce and debate the $3.5 trillion spending bill that includes many of President Joe Biden’s top priorities.
The vote to move ahead with the bill was taken in the late-night hours on Tuesday. It passed along party lines, with 220 votes in favor and 212 against. No Republican voted for the measure.
Now, House committees will start writing the details of the massive spending package. After the House committees do that and eventually pass the package — as is expected — it will head to the Senate. There, Democrats will likely use budget reconciliation to push it through the upper chamber without any support from Republicans.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi brokered a compromise with some of the more moderate members of her party in the House by committing to vote on the bipartisan infrastructure bill the Senate already passed. That $550 billion bill will see a vote in the House by September 27 at the latest.
In a statement following the vote, Pelosi said:
“I am committing to pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill by September 27. I do so with a commitment to rally House Democratic support for its passage.
“We must keep the 51-vote privilege by passing the budget and work with House and Senate Democrats to reach agreement in order for the House to vote on a Build Back Better Act that will pass the Senate.”
Despite that compromise, this week shows that there isn’t complete unity among the Democratic Party about whether this $3.5 trillion budget is something that will be good for the majority of Americans. In fact, the apparent divide between the progressive and moderate wings of the party could drag out the process longer than was initially expected.
Before the vote was taken, members of the Biden administration called around to the moderate Democrats who were skeptical of the plan. They advocated for the proposal Pelosi put forward, and tried to emphasize that the budget and infrastructure bills were both critical to meeting the president’s agenda.
The eight centrist Democrats were led by New Jersey Representative Josh Gottheimer. Their main concern was combining the bipartisan infrastructure bill with the budget bill, and the potential that the infrastructure package would be pushed to the side while Democrats focused on their progressive agenda.
Following the compromise and vote, though, the group of centrists issued a statement saying they’ve “established a path forward that ensures we can pass this once-in-a-century infrastructure investment by September 27th, allowing us to create millions of jobs and bring our nation into the 21st century.”
On the path to getting to that point, the United States is set to spend trillions of dollars more at a time when the country is already in a lot of debt.
