Democrats pushed their expansive $3.5 trillion framework for bolstering family services, health, and environment programs toward Senate passage Tuesday, as Republicans unleashed an avalanche of amendments aimed at making their rivals pay a price in next year’s elections.
Congressional approval of the budget resolution, which seems assured, would mark a crucial first step by Democrats toward enacting the heart of President Joe Biden's domestic agenda. It would open the door to a follow-up measure aiming the government's fiscal might at assisting families, creating jobs and fighting climate change, with higher taxes on the wealthy and big companies footing much of the bill.
Senate Budget Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., once a progressive voice in Congress' wilderness and now a national figure with legislative clout, said the measure would help children, families, the elderly and working people — and more.
"It will also, I hope, restore the faith of the American people in the belief that we can have a government that works for all of us, and not just the few," he said.
Republicans argued that Democrats' proposals would waste money, raise economy-wounding taxes, fuel inflation and codify far-left dictates that would harm Americans. They were happy to use Sanders, a self-avowed democratic socialist, to try tarring all Democrats backing the measure.
If Biden and Senate Democrats want to "outsource domestic policy to Chairman Sanders" with a “historically reckless taxing and spending spree," Republicans lack the votes to stop them, conceded Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. “But we will debate. We will vote."
Budget resolution passage is critical because in the 50-50 Senate, it would let Democrats alone approve a subsequent bill actually enacting their spending and tax policies. Approval of the budget would shield the follow-on legislation from Republican filibusters, procedural delays that kill bills.
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