Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (DN.Y.) promised in late July to add Manchin’s furlough reform legislation to a government funding bill that must pass in late September in order to secure Manchin’s vote for the Inflation Reduction Act, which included hundreds of billions of dollars to fight climate change. The original plan was to pass the stopgap funding measure, allowing the reform to go through the Senate first, putting pressure on House Democrats to follow through to avoid a possible government shutdown in early October. But now Republican senators say a continuing resolution in conjunction with the reform proposal allowing Manchin’s approval likely won’t muster 10 GOP votes in the upper chamber. They say there is no appetite to give Manchin a big policy and political victory after he shocked them over the summer by announcing a deal with Schumer on the Lower Inflation Act. “I don’t think you can count on any Republican to commit to voting for something they haven’t seen,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who expressed concern that Manchin has yet to release an updated draft of the licensing reform bill. “In general, Republicans are in favor of reform. I think given what Senator Manchin has done on the reconciliation bill it has caused a lot of bad blood,” Cornyn added. Many Republicans felt misled by Manchin after he announced his support for sweeping tax reform and the climate bill just hours after Republican senators voted down a $280 billion chip and science bill — something Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) threatened to block if Democrats were still actively considering a budget reconciliation bill with tax hikes. “Relationships are important here, and I think people felt they were being taken aback,” Cornyn said. “There’s not a lot of sympathy on our part for rewarding Senator Manchin for flip-flopping on reconciliation.” Cornyn and many other Senate Republicans are pushing to replace Manchin’s proposal with enabling reform legislation crafted by his home-state colleague, Sen. Sheleigh Moore Capito (RW.Va.), that would do more to speed up approval of mining. fossil fuel and other projects. Republican Sen. Whip John Thune (SD) also expressed serious doubts about the prospect of a short-term government funding measure getting 10 or 11 Republican votes to overcome a filibuster if Manchin’s enabling reform bill is included. “I think the most likely way to get an outcome is for them to try to build 12 Democrats on Capito’s proposal,” Thune said. Thune warned that passing a continuing resolution to avoid a government shutdown is “a much heavier scent” if the legislation is first considered in the Senate with Manchin’s proposal as part of it. He said Republican support would be much stronger for a funding measure that included Capito’s version of enabling reform. Republicans have doubts whether Manchin’s proposal goes far enough or whether it will be implemented by the Biden administration. “We understand based on what we know that it’s not very strong,” Thune said of Manchin’s language, adding, “there’s a ton of skepticism on our part.” Until now, most of the attention in Washington on the fight to fund the government has focused on House progressives’ strong opposition to Manchin’s reform bill. More than 70 House Democrats signed a letter released by Natural Resources Committee Chairman Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.) expressing strong opposition to adding the reform permit to the continuing resolution. Democratic leaders, however, are sticking to their plan to combine the two measures, betting that House progressives will go along with it at the last minute to avoid a federal government shutdown a month before the election. While House progressives have voiced their opposition to Manchin’s deal with Schumer to combine the government funding bill and allow for reform, they have not vowed to vote against the package. Schumer, meanwhile, is paving the way to garner as many Democratic votes as possible for his controversial side deal with Manchin. He hands environmentalists a modest victory this week by holding a vote to ratify the Kigali Amendment, a global agreement to curb emissions of climate-changing hydrofluorocarbons. One Democratic senator said ratifying the Kigali Amendment “probably” helps secure Democrats’ pro-environment votes for Manchin’s reform deal because they could then point to another legislative achievement aimed at fighting global warming . Schumer is also giving Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), a swing vote on Manchin’s enabling reform proposal, a vote on one of his top priorities this week — the Disclosure Act — even though he doesn’t have chances of passing. the conclave. The Democratic leader is separately raising the stakes of an upcoming vote on a short-term funding resolution, preparing to include emergency funding for Ukraine in the legislation. Democratic senators say the plan is to pass the funding bill late next week and block the House — assuming the measure ends up with Manchin’s language. Schumer is betting that House progressives would fold in such a scenario, they say. Although House progressives have expressed opposition to allowing reforms, they have not explicitly pledged to defeat the funding gap if it is included. But that scenario is likely not to happen if the GOP refuses to cast votes on any measure that includes a win for Manchin. Sen. Richard Shelby (Ala.), the top Republican on the Appropriations Committee, which is negotiating the short-term funding bill, said it would pass more easily without attaching the reform Manchin allowed. On the grass: War in Ukraine to dominate debates at UN LIV Golf CEO Greg Norman visits Capitol Hill to discuss league plans with lawmakers “The cleaner the better,” he said, acknowledging that many Republicans do not want to vote for a side deal with Schumer that secured Manchin’s vote on the budget reconciliation bill in August. Shelby said he personally supports passing the reform, but called Manchin’s change of direction on the tax and climate bill “a pretty raw political deal.” —Updated at 7:02 p.m
