For the first time in seven years, the Senate Appropriations Committee last week passed a bipartisan bill funding the departments of Labor and Health and Human Services. It's the largest spending bill after the one for the Defense Department and has been "a perennial source of partisan strife," according to The Hill.
The drama-free passage was an important victory for McConnell, who has staked the Senate Republican majority on the argument that Republicans know how to govern. Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., told The Hill that, "Behind the closed doors of the conference, he emphasizes over and over again that he wants to keep the extraneous things off and do what people expect us to do."
The full Senate is now poised to act on the Labor HHS bill, which hasn't passed the chamber as a stand-alone measure since 2007—and, which hasn't come close to passing the Senate in recent years because it routinely was bogged down in fights over policy riders affecting Affordable Care and labor issues.
In 2013, the government shut down for 16 days because Republicans, led by freshman Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, insisted on language that would have blocked the implementation of the ACA. Then, the government almost shut down again in 2015 because of a fight over funding Planned Parenthood.
This time, McConnell has worked closely with Senate Appropriations Chairman Thad Cochran, R-Miss., to keep riders from sinking spending bills before they get to the floor. "There's a commitment between Leader McConnell and Chairman Cochran to move bills and get them to the floor. The leadership has been very helpful with floor time," a Senate GOP aide told The Hill.
This year's Labor-HHS bill does include a policy rider prohibiting the administration from using its appropriated funds to pay for ACA's risk corridor program, which reimburses insurances companies that suffer higher costs because of the healthcare law and it also includes language that eliminates funding for the Independent Payment Advisory Board which was included in the ACA to reduce the growth of Medicare.
But both of those policy riders were part of last year's omnibus spending deal and don't represent new battles, The Hill says. However, the current bill avoids add-ons to defund Planned Parenthood or reverse the new federal rules mandating overtime pay for some salaried workers. It also doesn't take on new regulations that require retirement advisers to put their clients' financial interests ahead of their own.
McConnell wants to avoid paralyzing political fights because Republicans have to defend Senate seats in states President Obama won in 2008 and 2012, The Hill says. Appealing to moderate Democrats and independents could help endangered Republican Sens. Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Rob Portman of Ohio and Mark Kirk of Illinois win reelection.
However, the early winner from this year's deal on labor and health spending may be Roy Blunt, R-Mo., a member of McConnell's leadership team who faces a tough reelection race in Missouri. Blunt, the chairman of the Labor-HHS Appropriations Subcommittee, teamed up with Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., the ranking Democrat, to produce a bill without new controversial riders and he worked with Murray last month to craft a compromise amendment that allocated $1.1 billion in emergency funds to combat the Zika virus.
Blunt noted the legislation includes the riders Obama agreed to as part of last year's omnibus deal. "We just didn't put any new riders in. It wasn't easy but there's real sense for how important it is for these debates to happen on the Senate floor rather than in committee," Blunt said.
Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., has so far taken a different approach in the House, giving his members free rein to add various policy riders in committee--but that approach is proving unworkable. It suffered an embarrassing setback last month when a bill funding energy and water programs failed because Democrats united against it, citing policy riders affecting the environment and firearms regulations that were added at the committee level, according to The Hill.
Now, it seems that House Republican leaders are moving to follow McConnell's "no drama" approach. They announced Wednesday they will start restricting politically charged amendments on spending bills.
Well, it is a long time until October when the new budget is required by the Constitution—and, in this supercharged political environment it is difficult to believe that budget bills "free of drama" will emerge across the board. It does seem to suggest that the Congress is increasingly convinced that creating a workable budget may be more important than a brief victory with some short-term talking points, even when political lives are on the line, Washington Insider believes.