House is left on sidelines by the Senate

The Senate will serve as the primary legislative battleground between
the two parties over the next six months, leaving House lawmakers
mostly spectators.

The House already has passed two of the biggest challenges facing the upper chamber: Wall Street reform and comprehensive energy and climate legislation. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has made clear that the House will act on immigration reform only if the Senate approves a measure first.

{mosads}House Democrats have little desire for more controversial action until the Senate shows it can digest its agenda. House leaders compiled a list earlier this year showing that the Senate had yet to move on 290 House-passed bills, and Pelosi has promised freshmen and other politically vulnerable Democrats she won’t ask them to take tough votes — even beyond immigration — unless the Senate moves first.

“The main action for a while is going to be in the Senate,” said Steve Elmendorf, a prominent Democratic lobbyist. “I think that’s OK with a lot of House guys, because they had to break a lot of arms to get people to vote for [various bills] and they don’t want to do hard things for a while.”

Added Bill Samuel, the AFL-CIO legislative director: “They could keep going but don’t think there’s an appetite to go much further until they see the Senate start passing bills.”

Samuel and other union leaders are fighting for time for labor’s priorities, including a yearlong extension of unemployment insurance, federal Medicaid assistance to the states and $23 billion to save teaching jobs. But labor groups will have to compete with environmentalists and proponents of immigration reform, who are pushing their own time-consuming priorities.

Having moved first on President Barack Obama’s top priorities — financial reform and an energy and climate bill — the House isn’t likely to get much of the spotlight in the waning days of the 111th Congress. The chamber is expected to easily pass additional jobs-related bills with majority votes.

But the dynamics of the Senate — with its plodding pace, high threshold for passing bills and stark partisanship — have put the rest of Obama’s agenda in question.

“Potentially, the Senate may pass a much more slimmed-down agenda than first meets the eye,” said Ross K. Baker, professor of political science at Rutgers University.

“The only thing that’s going to be done is the revision of financial regulations,” said Baker, who thinks immigration reform and comprehensive energy and climate legislation have little chance of passing.

“I would take immigration off the list immediately,” said Baker, who ranked an energy and climate bill a “poor second” after Wall Street reform.

This is a prevalent view among political observers, although Senate Democratic leaders insist they are committed to passing both this year.

Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (Ill.) acknowledged the Senate must pick up the pace if it is to pass its ambitious agenda. He noted that Republican stalling tactics forced the chamber to spend an entire week on a monthlong extension of unemployment benefits and another week on a handful of nominations.

“I hope we can pick up the pace around here,” Durbin told reporters Monday. “We need to pick up the pace to finish these important measures.”

{mosads}Many of the Senate’s days this year have slipped by uneventfully because of partisan procedural disputes that have left C-SPAN cameras filming the empty floor.

A spokesman for Pelosi disputed the notion that the House has diminished in importance.

Nadeam Elshami said House Democrats would continue to try to pass important job-creation legislation, extend unemployment benefits and plan to negotiate important changes to the Wall Street reform bill once the Senate passes its version.

He also said House Democrats helped put political pressure on Senate Republicans to force them to begin debate of the Wall Street measure.

Durbin said the Wall Street reform bill could pass after two weeks of floor consideration.

Durbin said leaders also want to pass food safety and patent reform measures and haven’t given up on approving a budget resolution and appropriations bills as well.

A senior GOP aide said three weeks was more likely, noting that the Senate would not begin voting on amendments until Tuesday and could be out of session on Friday.

That would leave a week — or two — to pass a package of tax extenders, a yearlong unemployment insurance extension and Medicaid assistance. Leaders would have to decide whether to also cram in the budget resolution or a military supplemental spending bill for Iraq and Afghanistan operations before the Memorial Day recess beginning May 28.

When Congress returns to work on June 7, it would then have four weeks to pass energy and climate legislation or immigration reform before the weeklong Fourth of July recess.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has said the energy bill will move first but compromise legislation crafted by Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) appears shaky.

The authors have already postponed its unveiling by two weeks, and Graham has threatened to scuttle it if Democrats move ahead with immigration reform.

Environmentalists say there is enough time to get their bill passed but are growing anxious.

“They’ll have to move quickly once the process gets started,” said David Hamilton, director of the Sierra Club’s Global Warming and Energy Program.

Senate insiders say the bill could drag because the recent disaster off Louisiana’s coast has created new concerns over an offshore drilling proposal. They also say a jurisdictional demand by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) could slow action.

Proponents of immigration reform have put pressure on Reid and Obama to focus more on their issue.

“For us, the sooner, the better,” said Clarissa Martinez De Castro, director of immigration and national campaigns at the National Council of La Raza, a pro-immigrant group. “I wish we were on the floor with a bill already.”

These labor, environmental and immigration activists have all turned their attention to the Senate’s ticking clock.

Sweeping bills, such as the energy and immigration proposals now pending, have historically taken up weeks of the calendar. The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 spent seven weeks on the floor; the 2002 energy bill took eight weeks.

Democrats now control a bigger majority than Republicans did in 2001 and 2002, but the healthcare reform bill still took more than a month of floor time — and that was when Democrats had 60 seats.

Adding to the time pressure, leaders have scheduled a five-week break beginning Aug. 7, giving themselves a four-week work period after the July 4 break.

Lobbyists say they expect Congress to work into September but not beyond, as lawmakers, including Reid, who is facing a tough reelection race, are eager to return home to campaign.

“If you count the number of days Congress is in session between now and the end, it’s a lot less,” said Elmendorf.