It was reported earlier today that Senate Democratic leaders have assessed that they will not be able to move President Biden’s latest massive spending bill called “Build Back Better” anytime soon so they are shifting instead to a ‘voting rights’ bill Republicans have blasted as a federal takeover of elections.
The news came in the form of a tweet Wednesday morning from Jesse Rodriguez, the vice president of editorial and booking at MSNBC.
“NBC News: Senate expected to shelve Build Back Better bill, moving forward aggressively now on voting rights,” he wrote.
Rodriguez then followed that tweet up with another containing a link to an NBC News report that provided more details:
Democrats in the Senate are preparing to miss their self-imposed deadline to pass President Joe Biden’s $1.7 trillion social safety net bill before the end of the year, according to four sources familiar with planning by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s office.
The decision to try again next year is based on simple math — Schumer doesn’t have the 50 votes needed to pass the legislation thanks to Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., who remains a holdout.
The decision is also in part because Senate Democrats haven’t finished negotiating the bill. Provisions on state and local taxes and the methane rule remain undecided. Senate Democrats also haven’t finished clearing all the procedural hurdles necessary to hold a vote.
The network quoted a pair of congressional sources, both of whom said that the vote on BBB could be delayed until March.
For his part, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said that the legislation isn’t dead.
“The president and Sen. Manchin are having many discussions, and we’re waiting to see the outcome of those,” he said.
NBC then noted that Schumer is set to pivot to a so-called “voting rights” measure instead, which Republicans have blasted as a naked attempt to skew voting around the country and override legitimate voter integrity measures that have passed in several red states since the chaotic 2020 election.
They also note that under the Constitution, states have primary responsibility for establishing rules for voting, not Congress.
But that measure faces a major hurdle as well: No Republicans in the 50-50 chamber support it, so it can’t come close to the 60-vote filibuster threshold.
