Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said Democrats will settle their differences and pass a $3.5 trillion spending package in September despite warnings from key centrists that the price tag is too high and complaints from liberals that it falls short.
“We’ve got a chance,” Schumer told reporters on Wednesday. “It’s a good, decent chance.”
The New York Democrat made the prediction hours after Senate Democrats advanced the $3.5 trillion spending framework in a resolution that allows them to pass the bill with only 51 votes.
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That means all 50 Senate Democrats will have to support the bill in order for it to pass with the tiebreaking vote of Vice President Kamala Harris.
“We all need to be unified, and everyone knows that,” Schumer said. “So, that doesn’t mean people don’t fight for their beliefs, but at the end of the day, we have to come together. Thus far, we have.”
Schumer will have to broker an agreement that can win the support of his Left and centrist factions.
Two centrists, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, have warned the $3.5 trillion price tag is too high.
In a statement on Wednesday, Manchin warned he has “serious concerns about the grave consequences facing West Virginians and every American family if Congress decides to spend another $3.5 trillion.”
Democrats have pledged to pay for the bill with tax hikes on corporations and the wealthy, but so far, only about half the measure appears to be offset.
Schumer said the entire measure will be covered, mostly through tax increases.
“We intend to pay for it,” Schumer said. “And we intend to pay for it … by closing loopholes and having the wealthy and the big corporations finally pay their fair share.”
The spending package would cover an array of social welfare programs including free universal preschool, free community college, expanded Medicare benefits, and funding for caring for the sick, elderly, and disabled.
The framework advanced in the Senate early on Wednesday would also provide a pathway to citizenship for millions of illegal workers and would implement climate change mitigation policies.
House lawmakers will interrupt their summer recess and return Aug. 23 to take up the measure, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, a Maryland Democrat, announced Tuesday.
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Republicans are expected to oppose the spending legislation unanimously.
All 49 GOP senators voting on Wednesday opposed the budget blueprint.
“The Democratic majority has set in motion a blueprint that will incentivize further illegal immigration, increase rampant inflation, and dramatically grow the size of government,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, said after voting against the resolution. “The radical Green New Deal aspects of the budget resolution will lead to higher energy prices.”
