May23

electoral-vote.com

Dem 47

   

GOP 53

In the House: Johnson Herds the Cats

As anticipated, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) scheduled a vote on Donald Trump's budget bill for very late on Wednesday night (or, really, very early Thursday morning), and managed to get the bill passed, by the skin of his teeth. In order to keep this manageable, here are the 10 things that we think are most useful to know:

1. A Nailbiter: The final vote on the bill was 215-214-1, with two Republicans (Thomas Massie, KY, and Warren Davidson, OH) crossing the aisle to vote with the Democrats. Both of them feel the bill did not do enough to cut spending. Republican Andy Harris (MD) voted "present" for the same reason. Republicans David Schweikert (AZ) and Andrew Garbarino (NY) did not vote, the former because he "stepped out" and the latter because he fell asleep due to the marathon session. The upshot is that it may look like Johnson cannot afford a single defection after the Senate makes changes to the bill, but he probably actually has a 3-vote margin to work with.
   
   
2. Freedom Caucus? More Like Freedom Cuck-us: Forgive the somewhat vulgar verbiage, but this is the FC's verbiage when referring to others, so it's only fair it should be applied to them, when appropriate. Folks like Reps. Chip Roy (R-TX) and Andy Biggs (R-AZ) talk a big game about how they are "nay" votes unless they get exactly what they want. But then, a group of them headed to the White House to lay out their list of demands, only to have Donald Trump explode, tell them they bloody well better get on board (although using the American slang, not the British), and then storm out of the room. The FCers, excepting Massie (who wasn't there) and Davidson (who apparently was) meekly submitted. At this point, it is safe to assume that anything and everything the FCers say, when it comes to their "demands" for legislation, is just hot air until they demonstrate otherwise.
   
   
3. Good News for the Rich: The single-biggest "price tag" that comes with the new bill is the $2.2 trillion that it will cost to extend the 2017 tax cuts. Those tax cuts were designed to mostly go to the wealthiest Americans, and so extending them another 10 years is a big win for those people. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has already crunched the numbers and confirmed this; it estimates that the top 10% of Americans, by income, will have 3% more money in 2029 than they would have without the bill, 1% more in 2031, 2% more in 2033, and 4% more in 2037.
   
   
4. Mixed News for the Middle Class: At first glance, it looks like the middle class will get some help from the new bill, because the SALT cap is going up, as is the standard deduction. However, most student loan forgiveness is going away; that's going to hurt many middle-class households. And if the tax bill or the trade war damages the economy—especially by making money more expensive for both the government and banks to borrow—then the cost savings felt by Middle America will disappear out the back door in the form of higher credit card rates, higher mortgage payments, higher grocery costs, etc.
   
   
5. Bad News for the Poor: There are a few things in the bill for poor people, like TRUMP accounts for newborns to begin saving for... retirement, apparently. However, these are largely political theater, because they are paired with giant cuts to antipoverty food assistance (SNAP) and to Medicaid. As we have written, these cuts are based on the claim that able-bodied people, especially able-bodied men, are going to be kicked off the dole. In fact, the numbers make clear that the people who will be affected most are not goldbricks, but instead women who are acting as caregivers, either to their own children, or to ailing relatives (like sick parents). The Medicaid cuts, if enacted, will cause roughly 8 million people to lose health insurance. And the SNAP cuts, if enacted, will cause roughly 3 million people to lose food assistance.
   
   Put it this way: The "Trump Accounts" are going to cost the government about $17 billion. The Medicaid and SNAP cuts are going to save the government just shy of $1.1 trillion. So, for every new dollar in spending that poor people get, they're going to lose something like $50. The CBO analysis we link to above affirms this; it is estimated that the lowest 10% of income earners will have 4% less money in 2029, 2031 and 2033 than they otherwise would have without the bill, and then 2% less in 2037.
   
   
6. The Populists Are Unhappy: The defining feature of populism is opposition to entrenched political and economic power, on the part of those who feel they have been victimized by that entrenched power. Right-wing populism also includes a healthy dollop of social conservatism (opposition to Darwin/evolutionary theory during the original Populist Era, opposition to foreigners and LGBTQ people, especially T people, now), but the key is the David vs. Goliath dynamic.
   
   Donald Trump, of course, was elected on populist messaging, promising that despite being a child of privilege and wealth, he would do everything he could to fight for the little guy. The House bill contains a few sops to that, like canceling taxes on tips (an idea that is now popular enough that it passed by unanimous consent in the Senate this week). On the whole, however, it's a fairly traditional Republican bill, with good stuff for the rich, and relatively little for the little guy, as we note above. We are not sure who the leading right-wing populist in the country is right now. One possibility is Steve Bannon, who is very unhappy about the budget bill. The other possibility is Oren Cass, who is also very unhappy about the budget bill.
   
   
7. The Math Is Shaky: As is generally the case with budget bills, regardless of the party that is pushing them, this one is based on optimistic math. And that math is particularly unlikely to add up in this case. The Republicans' number-crunching concludes that the bill will ultimately produce an additional $2.6 trillion in tax revenue over the next 10 years, thus bringing the total contribution to the debt down to about $1 trillion. The nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation is not nearly as rosy in its projections, concluding that the total gain will be something more like $100 billion over the next 10 years. And if you put "rapidly growing deficit, and thus rapidly growing national debt" together with "skittish bond market, like we've seen this week," it could well be a recipe for disaster.
   
   
8. Contemptible: We have already mentioned, a couple of times, that a favorite trick of legislators is to bury things deep within a mega-bill, in hopes that nobody will notice until it's too late. There is at least one very clear example of this in the megabill, included as Section 70302. Here is what that section says:

   No court of the United States may use appropriated funds to enforce a contempt citation for failure to comply with an injunction or temporary restraining order if no security was given when the injunction or order was issued pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 65(c), whether issued prior to, on, or subsequent to the date of enactment of this section.

   What this means, in plain English, is that except in the (very rare) federal cases that a party is required to post a bond before the commencement of the legal process, federal judges would not be allowed to issue contempt orders. That would thus take away virtually all judicial power to enforce restraining orders, injunctions, etc. And it's not just going forward; the law is written to extend all the way back to the beginning of time.
   
   Every single person reading this knows why Donald Trump and the Republicans want to weaken the courts in this way. So, it's very possible this passage survives even after the Senate gets its hands on the bill. It is not going to survive the inevitable court cases arguing that this provision is unconstitutional. But that nonetheless adds another layer of lawsuits and appeals and rulings that will allow the Trump administration to keep the waters muddy for at least another year.
   
   
9. Eco-Unfriendly: The single-biggest cost savings in the bill is the cuts to Medicaid, which will save about $800 billion over 10 years. The second-biggest is getting rid of Joe Biden-era money meant to fight climate change, like the tax credits for electric vehicles, and the subsidies for businesses that launch eco-friendly projects. The "savings" here will be about $675 billion. Either Republicans do not understand, or do not care, that: (1) when you pay 10% of the cost of something, and private interests pay the other 90%, the government gets that 10% back eventually, and (2) the costs of global warming, if unchecked, are going to make $675 billion look like loose change in the couch.
   
   
10. The Senate Is Not Happy: The moderate Republican senators, like Lisa Murkowksi (AK), do not appear to have made a public statement yet. But some of the budget hawks in the Senate have already expressed their displeasure with the House bill. Leading the charge, at least early on, is Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI), who said yesterday that the budget cuts are not enough, and "Listen, in the House, President Trump can threaten to primary [holdouts], and those guys want to keep their seats. I understand the pressure. Can't pressure me that way." There's no doubt that Rand Paul (R-KY), is going to be a "nay" on virtually any bill, just like his fellow Kentuckian Massie. Will Johnson and other hawks actually insist on big changes? Will Murkowski and other moderates push back on that? Will the House accept the Senate bill, once it's complete? All good questions, and we have no idea what the answers are.

That should be it for the budget wars for now. Congress is going to recess until early June, and then it will be time for the Senate to do whatever it's going to do. So, everyone gets a 10-day (or so) breather. (Z)