In March of 2020, the Senate passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act or the CARES Act. It was bigger than the original Senate proposal but smaller than the subsequent House proposal. Eventually, the two reconciled, and the CARES Act became law. In May of 2020, the House introduced a new COVID-19 economic relief proposal. The bill, known as the…
Remember that Tax Extenders Bill that seemed to be moving ahead? Consider it stalled. Amid a flurry of proposed amendments to the bill, Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) moved to consider a cloture motion on Amendment No. 3060 to H.R. 3474. H.R. 3474 is the Hire More Heroes Act, originally intended “[t]o amend the Internal Revenue…
The House has passed a budget deal – and convincingly so. But it will pass muster in the Senate? There are challenges, including concerns about increased spending and those pesky user fees. Are we in for another filibuster?
Rep. Tom Price (R-GA) has introduced H.R. 2009, referred to as the Keep the IRS Off Your Health Care Act of 2013 to prohibit the Secretary of the Treasury from enforcing the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010. The bill would bar IRS from enforcing the health care act as a result of the most recent tax exempt organization scandal.
After an extraordinary four year dry spell, the Senate has passed a formal budget proposal. It now goes to the House where, mark my words, it has zero chance of passing. Despite all of the back-slapping, the bill wasn’t all that popular in the Senate. The final vote resulted in a slim victory: 50-49. All…
What do Republicans and Democrats have in common? Neither party can seem to muster a bill to head off the sequester looming on Friday. Two proposals were raised in the Senate today to address the sequester. Both failed. The Republican proposal would have let the cuts stand and allowed the President to decide on the…
I was wrong. Remember when I said that the House was going to push off the debt ceiling for three months? Turns out they didn’t mean it. They meant four months. The House voted today to delay a decision on the debt ceiling for four more months, through May 18. The measure passed by a…
House Republican leaders announced over the weekend that they will vote this week on a plan to extend the debt ceiling for three more months so that they don’t have to do anything just yet. And to make us feel better, they swear that if Congress can’t pass a budget by then, they won’t get…
Lots going on in D.C. today so let me catch you up to speed. The Democratic Senate reached a compromise on the budget deal in the wee hours of the morning. The deal extended tax cuts for all except those at the very top – but didn’t touch spending. That, the Senate claims, they’ll tackle…
Don’t believe the hype: there is no deal on the budget. Yes, I saw all of the headlines, too, some of them to prompt readers to write me for details. Is there a payroll tax holiday? What about the adoption credit? What’s happening to capital gains? The quick answer: nothing. What happened was this: the…