House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has previously stated that she will only allow the House to pass President Joe Biden’s two-part infrastructure plan if the Senate first passes both bills.
Biden’s proposal includes a smaller infrastructure comprising approximately $1.2 trillion in spending expected to receive at least 60 votes in the Senate to defeat a Republican filibuster. The second part of the plan is a bill for more than $3.5 trillion in many projects not generally considered infrastructure. The larger bill will not receive any Republican support and will only pass as a budget reconciliation bill to sidestep the filibuster.
Pelosi now says the House will not open debate on the bipartisan bill unless the Senate first passes the larger bill through budget reconciliation with only Democratic support.
Pelosi appeared on ABC’s This Week on July 25 and told host George Stephanopoulos, “I hope that it will pass. I won’t put it on the floor unless we have the rest of the initiative.”
Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has suggested that he may follow in the footsteps of the Texas legislators who ran away from the Capitol in order to deny the Senate a quorum needed to vote on a budget reconciliation measure. Stephanopoulos brought up this possibility.
Pelosi responded, “You talk to Lindsey Graham about what he says. I’m telling you what’s going to happen in the House of Representatives, and that is that we’re rooting for the infrastructure bill to pass, but we all know more needs to be done.”
At an earlier press conference, Pelosi said, “Let me be obvious on this. We will not take up a bill in the House until the Senate passes the bipartisan bill and a reconciliation bill. If there is no bipartisan bill, then we’ll go when the Senate passes a reconciliation bill.”
“I’m very optimistic that it will happen. And I don’t want to say all the fears, and I don’t think they’re fears. They’re just advocating. And God bless them for doing that. But we’re not going down the path unless we all go down the path together,” she added.
During the same show, Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) said the smaller bipartisan bill was “about 90 percent” complete, stating, “We have one issue outstanding, and we’re not getting much response from the Democrats. It’s about mass transit.”
“What she has just said is entirely counter to what President Biden has committed to and what the Senate is doing, which is a two-track process. The infrastructure bill has nothing to do with the reckless tax-and-spend extravaganza she’s talking about,” Portman added.
