The word from Democratic sources, as reported by Cristina Marcos and Scott Wong with The Hill, is that Friday is the day the U.S. House of Representatives will vote on the $1.75 trillion reconciliation bill and on infrastructure. This comes after the votes have been announced and delayed multiple times and over the course of months.
"The House Rules Committee is expected to convene late Thursday night to advance the final text of the social spending legislation, according to Democratic sources familiar with the plan," Marcos and Wong wrote. They also added that the House will convene on Friday morning at 8:00am.
CNN's Manu Raju also tweeted an update.
House Ds have resolved another sticking point: How to deal with SALT. Under new SALT deal, deductions would be capped at $80,000 per year over a nine-year time span. Approach differs from Bernie Sanders’; Malinowski, who helped cut the deal, told me he’s talking w Sanders
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) November 5, 2021
With SALT resolved in House, the last two remaining issues are immigration and resolving concerns from moderates who want an accounting from CBO. But leaders say they are confident those will be resolved tomorrow
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) November 5, 2021
We have heard time and time again that Biden needs a win, as his approval ratings are underwater. It's worth emphasizing though that there is a lot of ground Biden has to make up, and so it remains to be seen if these agenda items finally passing will improve his ratings, especially as the midterms are now just one year away and fast-approaching.
As a matter of history, Democrats are already poised to lose seats during the midterms, since the president's party tends to do so. This is especially the case when presidential approval ratings are under 50 percent, and that has been the case for Biden for some time. Democrats also control the House by single digits and they only control the 50-50 Senate because Vice President Kamala Harris serves as a tie-breaking vote.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), as Spencer mentioned last week, in particular insisted that Democrats not "embarrass" Biden. It's quite possibly too late for that, though. Spencer also highlighted today some particularly egregious parts of the bill.
Throughout all of this, progressives have declared victory, as they've insisted that the legislation must be voted on together. Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), who is the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, has been firm that there are enough progressives who will vote against the infrastructure bill if this is not the case.
Pelosi makes no mention in her letter about timing of floor vote on the rule and the bill, which means they still don’t have the votes locked down. She circulates a WH analysis about the bill’s projection to cut the deficit. https://t.co/h75DOsqsdi But CBO has not scored it yet
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) November 5, 2021
Another series of tweets from Raju is awkward for Pelosi. He highlights Thursday press releases from the Speaker's office that claim the Build Back Better spending bill is fully paid for. However, it contains no links. And, as Raju shared, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has not scored the bill yet.