This week in Congress update

The Senate passed the “bipartisan” infrastructure bill by a vote of 69-30. Nineteen Republicans voted with every Democrat to pass the bill. You can see the vote here. On Sunday, the Senate passed an amendment waiving all budget points of order so no senator could object to the gimmicks in this bill to hide the true costs. You can see that vote here. The bill now goes to the House, where Speaker Nancy Pelosi has announced it will not be considered until the Senate passes the $3.5 trillion “human” infrastructure bill that is supposed to be passed under reconciliation. At this point, it does not look like anything will be considered by the House until September. The first step in passing the human infrastructure bill under reconciliation is for the Senate to pass a budget containing instructions to the Senate committees to draft legislation “reconciling” spending levels of programs under their jurisdiction with spending levels outlined in the budget. In order to qualify for reconciliation, provisions must have a substantial effect on spending, taxes, or debt. The reconciliation instructions include creating a new federal health care program for Americans in states that did not enact ObamaCare’s Medicaid expansion, creating a new universal pre-K program, creating a federal “Civilian Climate Corps,” funding “Community Violence Intervention” initiatives (which is likely going to be used to support Red Flag laws and other types of gun control), and funds for “smart technology” for border travel (which probably means more REAL ID or E-Verify tracking of US citizens who want to travel abroad). Democrats also plan to increase funding for the IRS to unleash agents to collect more tax revenue. You can read Campaign for Liberty Chairman Ron Paul on how the IRS menaces civil liberties here. You can read the memo from the Budget Committee to Democrat senators on the reconciliation bill here. You can read the Republican press release on the budget here.