4 ms·

What procedural trick? It received 60 votes in the Senate and a majority in the House.

by jljljl 10y ago

gozur88 10y ago
The final bill would not have survived a filibuster because the Democrats no longer had 60 votes. From wikipedia: "House Democrats had expected to be able to negotiate changes in a House-Senate conference before passing a final bill. Since any bill that emerged from conference that differed from the Senate bill would have to pass the Senate over another Republican filibuster, most House Democrats agreed to pass the Senate bill on condition that it be amended by a subsequent bill.[165] They drafted the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act, which could be passed by the reconciliation process.[166][169][170] As per the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, reconciliation cannot be subject to a filibuster. But reconciliation is limited to budget changes, which is why the procedure was not used to pass ACA in the first place; the bill had inherently non-budgetary regulations.[171][172] Although the already-passed Senate bill could not have been passed by reconciliation, most of House Democrats' demands were budgetary: "these changes—higher subsidy levels, different kinds of taxes to pay for them, nixing the Nebraska Medicaid deal—mainly involve taxes and spending. In other words, they're exactly the kinds of policies that are well-suited for reconciliation."[169]" Despite the gloss the wiki authors put on it, this is highly irregular. It's within the letter of Senate rules, but if you're expecting to ever get cooperation from the opposition party this is not the sort of stunt you want to pull. I saw a headline that said something along the lines that the Republicans plan to repeal the ACA using reconciliation, which would be poetic if true.
- Dylan16807 10y ago
  If I'm reading that right, both House and Senate approved almost the exact version that went into law, but some of them expected there to be more rounds of edits that didn't happen. So they avoided filibuster by suddenly being more cooperative than expected and not having more rounds of edits? I might be deeply misunderstanding, but that trick seems okay. Don't pass a bill if you don't want the bill becoming a law...
  - gozur88 10y ago
    The normal process is different bills pass different houses, then they go into a conference committee that produces a negotiated third version which then goes back to be voted on in each chamber. What happened in this case, as I understand it, was the Democrats in the Senate took a bill that had already passed, a bill addressing some other matter entirely, and rewrote it completely while maintaining it was the "negotiated third version" above, i.e. it was a reconciliation of the bill that had been discarded. I'm a bit fuzzy on the details, TBH, but that's the essence.
    - DrScump 10y ago
      Exactly. Plus, it violated Article 1 Section 7, which requires that revenue bills originate in the House. Then, the Democrat leadership argued that it wasn't actually a tax, so Clause 1 didn't apply. Then, in the infamous Supreme Court case, they argued that it was a tax and therefore couldn't be challenged before collections actually begin due to the Pre-emption clause. The process of taking a bill in progress and completely rewriting it (while retaining "credit" for those procedural steps the original bill completed) is commonly known as "gut-and-amend".
    - Dylan16807 10y ago
      >What happened in this case, as I understand it, was the Democrats in the Senate took a bill that had already passed, a bill addressing some other matter entirely, and rewrote it completely while maintaining it was the "negotiated third version" above, i.e. it was a reconciliation of the bill that had been discarded. That's not what the text around your quote says. In fact reading it in full context implies that nobody got tricked. First the senate broke the filibuster and passed the act. Then the house, realizing that breaking another filibuster was unlikely, decided to pass a version that was compatible with the senate version and only needed budget reconciliation. Then it passed without the ability to filibuster and became a law. I don't see where a bill addressing something different comes into the picture. I don't see any deception. Am I missing something?
      - gozur88 10y ago
- jljljl 10y ago
  Using the term rammed through feels like a stretch given the description. The bills were negotiated for over a year, and liberal features like the public option and coverage for abortion were removed due to Republican and independent opposition. The bill ultimately received a Supermajority in the Senate and a majority in the house in regular voting, and not through reconciliation. The Republicans are unlikely to pass the repeal through the senate with anything close to the same numbers. You allude to the origination clause below, but that argument was rejected by the courts, and the Supreme Court declined to hear it. The first version of the bill was also introduced in the House, as was the original revenue bill that the senate bill was built onto.

What procedural trick? It received 60 votes in the Senate and a majority in the House.

by jljljl 10y ago

What procedural trick? It received 60 votes in the Senate and a majority in the House.

The final bill would not have survived a filibuster because the Democrats no longer had 60 votes. From wikipedia: "House Democrats had expected to be able to negotiate changes in a House-Senate conference before passing a final bill. Since any bill that emerged from conference that differed from the Senate bill would have to pass the Senate over another Republican filibuster, most House Democrats agreed to pass the Senate bill on condition that it be amended by a subsequent bill.[165] They drafted the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act, which could be passed by the reconciliation process.[166][169][170] As per the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, reconciliation cannot be subject to a filibuster. But reconciliation is limited to budget changes, which is why the procedure was not used to pass ACA in the first place; the bill had inherently non-budgetary regulations.[171][172] Although the already-passed Senate bill could not have been passed by reconciliation, most of House Democrats' demands were budgetary: "these changes—higher subsidy levels, different kinds of taxes to pay for them, nixing the Nebraska Medicaid deal—mainly involve taxes and spending. In other words, they're exactly the kinds of policies that are well-suited for reconciliation."[169]" Despite the gloss the wiki authors put on it, this is highly irregular. It's within the letter of Senate rules, but if you're expecting to ever get cooperation from the opposition party this is not the sort of stunt you want to pull. I saw a headline that said something along the lines that the Republicans plan to repeal the ACA using reconciliation, which would be poetic if true.

Dylan16807 10y ago
If I'm reading that right, both House and Senate approved almost the exact version that went into law, but some of them expected there to be more rounds of edits that didn't happen. So they avoided filibuster by suddenly being more cooperative than expected and not having more rounds of edits? I might be deeply misunderstanding, but that trick seems okay. Don't pass a bill if you don't want the bill becoming a law...
- gozur88 10y ago
  The normal process is different bills pass different houses, then they go into a conference committee that produces a negotiated third version which then goes back to be voted on in each chamber. What happened in this case, as I understand it, was the Democrats in the Senate took a bill that had already passed, a bill addressing some other matter entirely, and rewrote it completely while maintaining it was the "negotiated third version" above, i.e. it was a reconciliation of the bill that had been discarded. I'm a bit fuzzy on the details, TBH, but that's the essence.
  - DrScump 10y ago
    Exactly. Plus, it violated Article 1 Section 7, which requires that revenue bills originate in the House. Then, the Democrat leadership argued that it wasn't actually a tax, so Clause 1 didn't apply. Then, in the infamous Supreme Court case, they argued that it was a tax and therefore couldn't be challenged before collections actually begin due to the Pre-emption clause. The process of taking a bill in progress and completely rewriting it (while retaining "credit" for those procedural steps the original bill completed) is commonly known as "gut-and-amend".
  - Dylan16807 10y ago
    >What happened in this case, as I understand it, was the Democrats in the Senate took a bill that had already passed, a bill addressing some other matter entirely, and rewrote it completely while maintaining it was the "negotiated third version" above, i.e. it was a reconciliation of the bill that had been discarded. That's not what the text around your quote says. In fact reading it in full context implies that nobody got tricked. First the senate broke the filibuster and passed the act. Then the house, realizing that breaking another filibuster was unlikely, decided to pass a version that was compatible with the senate version and only needed budget reconciliation. Then it passed without the ability to filibuster and became a law. I don't see where a bill addressing something different comes into the picture. I don't see any deception. Am I missing something?
    - gozur88 10y ago
jljljl 10y ago
Using the term rammed through feels like a stretch given the description. The bills were negotiated for over a year, and liberal features like the public option and coverage for abortion were removed due to Republican and independent opposition. The bill ultimately received a Supermajority in the Senate and a majority in the house in regular voting, and not through reconciliation. The Republicans are unlikely to pass the repeal through the senate with anything close to the same numbers. You allude to the origination clause below, but that argument was rejected by the courts, and the Supreme Court declined to hear it. The first version of the bill was also introduced in the House, as was the original revenue bill that the senate bill was built onto.