Democrats are paving the way to pass President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 package with just a simple majority in the upper chamber as administration officials are pouring cold water Republican lawmakers’ push for a smaller bill.
Senate Democrats voted 50-49 to advance a budget resolution that paves the way for lawmakers to pass the relief bill through budget reconciliation — which only requires 51-votes and is not subject to the filibuster.
Democrats currently hold 50-seats in the upper chamber, with Vice President Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) able to cast the tie-breaking vote.
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W. Va.), one of the more moderate Democratic senators, is a crucial vote when it comes to advancing legislation. While he voted for the budget resolution and signaled he would support passing a relief package through budget reconciliation, Manchin is calling for Democrats to work with Republicans on the bill.
During an appearance on Fox News on Tuesday, Manchin said, “We’re going to make this work in a bipartisan way. My friends on the other side are going to have input. And we’re going to do something that we agree on. I’m not going to do it just down the lines… just a party-line vote.”
“We built too much trust up among each other to allow this to follow apart. So they can count on me to make sure that we do everything to make this bipartisan,” he added.
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Manchin stated, “We’re not going to blow it down the line. They can’t do it down the line.”
The West Virginia senator said he voted in favor of passing the budget resolution so that Democrats could begin the process of budget reconciliation to try to pass a bill quickly.
However, he added, “I will vote in a bipartisan way.”
Without Manchin’s vote, or any Republican support, Democrats would be unable to pass the relief package through reconciliation as they would not have a tie-vote that would give Harris the ability to cast the tie-breaking vote.
Biden met with a group of 10 Republican senators at the White House on Monday to discuss their proposed $618 billion relief package.
White House officials described the meeting as “productive” but said Biden told the senators that their bill was not large enough. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Biden told the senators “that he will not slow down work on this urgent crisis response, and will not settle for a package that fails to meet the moment.”
She added that “while [Biden] is hopeful that the Rescue Plan can pass with bipartisan support, a reconciliation package is a path to achieve that end.”
Psaki has previously argued that using budget reconciliation to pass a relief bill would not preclude Republicans from in favor of it.
