WHAT HAS THIS CONGRESS DONE, EXACTLY?
By Lisa Desjardins,
@LisaDNews
Correspondent
Today’s
signing of the Inflation Reduction Act got us thinking more broadly about what Congress has done so far this year.
In U.S. history, the margins in Congress have
rarely been this thin. And yet, Democrats have managed to produce a platoon of major bills, including four in just the past three months.
Take a look at these 12 bills and topics, all passed during this Congress and presidency:
- Inflation Reduction Act. Climate, health and taxes.
- PACT Act. Veterans.*
- “CHIPS Plus.” China, U.S. high tech manufacturing.*
- Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. Guns and school safety.*
- Postal Service Reform Act. Keeping the U.S. Postal Service viable.*
- Emmett Till Antilynching Act. Hate crimes, racism.*
- Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act. Workplace sexual misconduct.*
- Bill establishing the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack.
- Juneteenth National Independence Day Act. Establishing Juneteenth as a federal holiday.*
- COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act. Hate crimes, racism.*
- Bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. All of the infrastructure.*
- The American Rescue Plan. COVID recovery.
Each tackled a significant issue or set a major new precedent. This is not to cast a value judgment – some were partisan, some were highly controversial and are still debated. But,
as the asterisks denote,
most of these were bipartisan. And all of them made headlines.
As the nation prepares again this November to decide who should run Congress, we thought it worth a deeper look at what Democrats did in the major bills passed under their watch.
Inflation Reduction Act. August 2022
Climate, health and tax bill
Size: $500-$700 billion, including deficit reduction — We are still awaiting the final score, or dollar estimate, on this bill from the Congressional Budget Office.
What it does: The so-called Inflation Reduction Act takes on four major issues at once:
- Climate and energy. The sweeping package of tax incentives (homes, electric cars, industry) in this bill are the nation’s most comprehensive response yet to the climate crisis. It also expands some drilling rights, but would charge companies more for that.
- Health care/drug prices. This bill caps out-of-pocket costs in Medicare and lets the program negotiate some drug prices for the first time.
- Taxes. The new law creates a 15 percent minimum tax on most large corporations. And it imposes a new 1 percent tax on stock buybacks.
- Deficit. After that, there is money left over — roughly $200 billion or so — that will go to paying down the nation’s long ballooning deficit.
What critics say: This is another partisan bill (no Republican voted for it), with conservatives charging that the business taxes will discourage jobs and innovation and the energy approach is a giveaway to liberal causes.
What supporters say: This is a carefully-balanced bill that answers pressing crises in reasonable ways.
Honoring our PACT Act. August 2022
Expansion of veterans benefits
Cost: $280 billion over a decade
What it does: Some have called this the
greatest expansion of veterans benefits in U.S. history. The PACT Act, as it’s known, guarantees coverage for a host of ailments for those affected by toxic substances while serving their country. That includes those who took in the fumes of burn pits. In all, millions of veterans’ lives will be changed.
What critics say: This bill is not paid for; it is all deficit spending.
What supporters say: This is a necessary cost.
“CHIPS Plus.” August 2022
Semiconductor manufacturing and competitiveness with China
Cost: $79 billion
What it does: Don’t let the sleek-seeming write-ups fool you. This is a
massive bill that
tackles competitiveness with China, especially in high tech and science, in dozens of ways. It’s best known for the $50 billion investment in tax incentives for the semiconductor industry. The bill was narrow at one late point – just the CHIPS/semiconductor legislation – but then grew many times over to be known as “CHIPS Plus.” (I like to call it “CHIPS Plus Plus Plus Plus Plus.”)
Whatever the name, this had broad bipartisan support, though, of course, it did not escape without some criticism.
What critics say: The legislation picked particular winners, including already profitable large companies.
What supporters say: The “winners” (large profitable companies as dubbed by critics above) were ready to move elsewhere and this bill creates American jobs and ultimately tackles future inflation on goods from washing machines to cars.
Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. June 2022
Gun and school safety
Cost: $13 billion in spending
What it does: This compromise, the first major gun bill passed by Congress in decades, involved trust and hard work from members of both parties following the massacre in Uvalde, Texas. It closes the so-called
“boyfriend loophole” related to gun ownership and domestic violence, makes it easier to do full background checks on young people trying to buy guns and spends billions on school safety and violence prevention, including mental health.
The bill passed the Senate decidedly and was also bipartisan in the House.
What (some) critics (on the right) say: This bill threatens gun rights without giving enough due process.
What critics (on the left) say: This falls far short of what’s needed.
What supporters say:
This is a
moderate, practical bill that does some good.
Postal Service Reform Act. April 2022
Overhauls Postal Service finances, helping it stay in business
What it does: This act makes tremendous strides in
addressing the Postal Service’s financial hemorrhaging, including removing a requirement that the agency set aside retiree health funds many years in advance. In all, it saves the nation’s mail system $50 billion. This was bipartisan from the start and passed with enormous support.
Emmett Till Antilynching Act. March 2022
Makes lynching a federal hate crime
What it does: At fewer than two pages, this is one of the shortest of the major bills passed by this Congress. But it was an idea that had
repeatedly failed in Congress for decades. This bill makes lynching, which includes racially motivated bodily harm to an individual, a
federal hate crime. It passed overwhelmingly; just three members of Congress
voted against it.
Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act. March 2022
What it does: A direct result of #MeToo revelations about workplace harassment, this bill bans the practice of forcing workers to sign away their right to take sexual misconduct claims to court. Known as
“forced arbitration,” the practice meant people preyed upon at work had only one recourse to address their complaints and it was easily skewed toward protecting and covering up misconduct. This bill passed both chambers with
broad bipartisan support.
Bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. November 2021
Size: $1.2 billion infrastructure bill ($550 billion in new spending).
What it does: Another massive piece of legislation (
the summary is 129 pages), supporters declared this a $1 trillion
“once-in-a-generation” investment in roads, bridges, trains, ferries, public transit, broadband, clean water and electric vehicle charging stations.
What critics say: Opponents questioned some of the spending and offsets in this bill.
Jan. 6 Select Committee. June 2021
What it does: After Republicans blocked the idea of a bipartisan commission, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and mostly Democrats passed a bill creating a House committee. The resulting investigation has been the broadest ever done by Congress. Its
public hearings have impacted a national conversation.
What critics say: There is vehement dismissal of the committee as a scripted and political affair aimed at attacking former President Donald Trump, and criticism specifically of Pelosi’s rejection of two of Republican leader Kevin McCarthy’s chosen appointees.
What supporters say:
Two Republicans serve on the committee, and insist they are focused on a serious investigation.
Juneteenth National Holiday. June 2021
What it does: Just a paragraph long, this bill made Juneteenth a federal holiday, the first new one in nearly 40 years. It passed with lightning speed and a
tidal wave of support.
COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act. May 2021
Focused bill on combating anti-Asian hate crimes.
What it does: In the wake of a stark increase in violence against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, this bill aimed to make it easier to report hate crimes and forced the Department of Justice to focus on hate crimes related to COVID-19. It took weeks to craft, but this
passed both chambers of Congress overwhelmingly. The bill is not a sea change in U.S. policy, but marked a significant and new approach by Congress, particularly for AAPI communities.
The American Rescue Plan. March 2021
Cost: $1.9 trillion economic and health recovery bill
What it says: The bill
was a juggernaut.
Just to name a few highlights, the bill:
- provided $2,000 direct payments to most Americans
- extended an additional $300 per week in unemployment benefits
- extended and expanded child tax credits
- dropped an unprecedented $362 billion in funding for states and cities
- spent billions on vaccines and COVID treatment
What critics say: The bill was a partisan, big-government over-response to the pandemic that fueled inflation.
What supporters say: This is a major force in poverty reduction and stability as the U.S. began to reopen.
Also worth mentioning:
- This Congress repeatedly passed bills toughening sanctions on Russia and sending aid to Ukraine.
- It brought back and reformed earmarks, allowing lawmakers to request and get federal funds for more local projects while requiring unprecedented transparency through the process.
At the same time, Democrats failed to tackle other issues and goals, or were not able to find ways to move on priorities, including universal child care and police reform.
CAN DEMOCRATS SAVE LIZ CHENEY?
By Matt Loffman,
@mattloff
Politics Producer
Wyoming Republican Rep. Liz Cheney is in trouble.
The Cowboy State was the most pro-Trump state in the 2020 election – giving former president Donald Trump
nearly 70 percent of the vote. Meanwhile, Cheney may be the most anti-Trump Republican in Congress.
Through her role as vice chair of the Jan. 6 committee, Cheney has become a frequent and vocal critic of the former president, and she has emerged as an unlikely hero for many Democrats in Wyoming, who praise her for standing up for the U.S. Constitution.
That’s why many Democrats we talked to during a recent reporting trip are planning to switch ballots and vote for Cheney in the Republican primary on Tuesday. Cheney’s campaign even sent mailers to every voter in the state explaining how to change parties, which Wyoming law allows up to Election Day.
