Category: Uncategorized

Below is an overview of relevant House and Senate committee hearings and markups on the schedule this week. It’s a short list – in the post-shutdown world, Congress is currently only focusing on a select handful of issues.

WEDNESDAY, October 30, 2013

Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
HELP Legislation and Nominations
Full Committee Markup
10 am, 430 Dirksen

Joint Economic Committee
Fiscal 2014 Budget
Conference Meeting
10 am, HC-5 Capitol Building

Joint Economic Committee
Farm Bill
Conference Meeting
1pm, 1100 Longworth Building

THURSDAY, October 31, 2013

Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
Full Committee Hearing
10 am, 430 Dirksen

While discussions are happening and proposals are beginning to take shape, there still is not a clear solution that will reopen the government or raise the debt ceiling before we hit the current limit on Thursday.

Senate leaders have been negotiating a deal for the past couple of days and appeared to be somewhat close to bringing it to the floor for a vote. Harry Reid described Tuesday as a “bright day”.  That process and optimism was abruptly halted today when the House GOP announced that they were introducing their own plan to reopen the government and raise the debt ceiling. Not surprisingly, the House and Senate plans are rumored to differ in some key ways which offers challenges in finding common ground with both chambers and getting something passed in the next 36 hours.

The Senate bill is thought to contain a short term plan to reopen the government and extend the debt limit while forcing bipartisan talks for a longer term solution. The House legislation includes a similar plan, but also tacks on certain Obamacare related provisions. The Senate has put their talks on hold to see what the House does next – although democrats and the White House have already openly dismissed the GOP plan. House Republicans are expected to bring their bill to the floor sometime this evening, although the latest news is that they are having trouble finding the votes in the their own part to pass the bill.

Senate leaders Harry Reid (D-NV) and Mitch McConnell (R-KY) continued negotiations over the weekend – searching for a deal that would raise the debt limit and reopen the government, but emerged with no deal in sight yet. A bipartisan group of 12 Senators are also currently in-closed door meetings this morning trying to work out the parameters of an agreement.

Some details about a potential plan from the Senate have emerged:

• Funding to run the government for 6 months
• Extend debt limit until Jan. 31, 2014
• Delay of the medical-device tax for 2 years
• More leeway provided to federal agencies to implement sequester cuts
• Mandate House-Senate budget talks

The sticking points right now seem to be the exact length of any extension of government funding or a debt ceiling increase, and FY14 spending levels. Democrats have indicated that they are willing to accept the $986 billion first-year sequester cap that was previously agreed upon, while Republicans are pushing for a cut in government spending a cap of $967 billion to be put in place in January.

While no concrete deal has been released, there seems to be a bit more optimism emerging from both parties. However, even if the Senate can agree on a bipartisan deal, it is unclear what the reaction would be by the House. Boehner would have a few options – pass a House deal that would need to go to the Senate for unlikely approval, pass the Senate bill which would be a clear defeat for the House GOP, or amend and pass a version of the Senate bill with addition terms.