Senate Fiddles While Jobless Workers Suffer
by Kathryn Baer June 25, 2010 03:00 PM (PT)
http://uspoverty.change.org/blog/view/senate_fiddles_while_jobless_workers_sufferAs I guess most of you know, the Senate has a rule that enables a minority of members to block a substantive vote on virtually any bill. It's called cloture — so named because it refers to a procedural vote to close debate and move on to a final vote.
Cloture requires a three-fifths majority — ordinarily 60 votes. So in a closely-divided Senate, like the one we have now, a handful of Senators have enormous leverage.
And have they ever been using it on the pending jobs/tax bill (H.R. 4213) that the House sent over in late May.
I thought by now I'd be telling you what the Senate managed to pass. Instead, I've been following a seemingly endless round of amendments and insider reports on what Senator Max Baucus (D-MT), Chairman of the Finance Committee, has been doing to get a couple of Republicans on board.
He figured he'd probably need at least two because Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE) had said that he wouldn't vote for anything — no extended unemployment benefits, no emergency aid to the states, no extension of the TANF Emergency Contingency Fund, no nothing — unless it was totally offset by other spending cuts, revenue raisers or a combination of both.
As of Thursday, the already-curtailed unemployment benefits extension had taken another hit. The extra $25 per week that's been in unemployment checks since Congress passed the economic recovery act was gone. This would have left the average weekly benefit at $284 — less than what would be need to lift a family of three above the notoriously low federal poverty line.
The extension of the higher-than-usual federal match on state Medicaid costs (FMAP) had been put back in the bill, but then whittled down by about a third, paving the way for more program cuts and job losses at the state and local levels.
The attempt to put the extension of COBRA health insurance subsidies back had definitively failed. So a very large percentage of jobless workers who had employer-sponsored health insurance will have no fallback unless (or until) they're poor enough to qualify for Medicaid.
The boost in food stamp benefits that has helped low-income people keep food on the table was terminated, as of mid-2014. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates the annual loss for a family of three at $476.
And the magic 60 votes still weren't there. So Senators packed up and went home for the weekend.
While they relax or do some campaigning, more than 1.2 million (pdf) jobless workers are without the extended unemployment benefits they thought they could count on.
The frustrated Democratic leadership reportedly leans toward "letting the dust settle" before making another try at cloture. This apparently means no further action until after Senators return from their week-long Fourth of July recess.
By then, at least 800,000 more people will have no unemployment benefits. But it's doubtful that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) will return to their plight — or any of the other jobs provisions in the bill — until he can count on 60 votes.
I know it seems like time to throw up our hands and move on, as Senator Reid seems inclined to do. But the many national advocacy organizations engaged in defending the safety net are urging us to contact our Senators, whether we've already done so or not.
Senators need to know that we want them to support full extensions of unemployment benefits and the higher Medicaid match and to reject any cut in food stamp benefits. And they need to know this right now, Democrats as well as Republicans.
Here's a toll-free number you can use to deliver the message: 1-888-245-0215. If you need to check who your Senators are, use the drop-down box at the top right of the Senate home page.
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