Calendar shows divided Congress

By Brian Friel

To get a sense of how things will work in the 112th Congress, look at next year’s House and Senate schedules.

Incoming House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., released separate 2011 calendars for their chambers the week of Dec. 6.

The leaders did not collaborate on scheduling, resulting in an unusually large number of weeks — at least 12 — when one chamber will be in session while the other takes a break.

“It just shows how much the leadership is not on the same page in the House and Senate,” said Brian Darling, director of Senate relations at the conservative- leaning Heritage Foundation.

With Republicans taking control of the House in January and the Democrats’ advantage in the Senate dropping to six seats, the divergent schedules are expected to add to the difficulty Congress is already having as it tries to advance legislation. Adopting the annual budget resolution, working out the final versions of bills in conference committees and sending measures to the president have been difficult with Democrats enjoying comfortable majorities in both chambers.

And, House and Senate leaders have outlined contrasting approaches to fundamental congressional duties that will add to the disconnect between the two chambers.

Expect the House and Senate to talk past each other much of the year, students of Congress say. Just look to Congress’ primary responsibility — appropriating money so the government will operate — for an example.

House Republicans plan to use the Appropriations Committee to find ways to cut the federal budget, and even floated the idea of splitting the 12 annual appropriations measures into smaller agency-by-agency bills.

The Senate Appropriations Committee, which last week produced a $1.1 trillion omnibus appropriations bill for fiscal 2011 that ultimately was pulled from consideration, plans no such changes.

“I never have an opinion on what the House does or doesn’t do,” said Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb. “They can do it their way, and I guess we’ll do it our way.”

Before Congress gets to fiscal 2012 appropriations measures, each chamber will develop a budget resolution setting overall spending levels for that fiscal year.

In the early 1980s, Democratic Houses and Republican Senates negotiated budget resolutions that a majority of each chamber agreed to, and even used the budget reconciliation process to push through tax and spending deals with just 51 votes in the Senate rather than today’s 60-vote standard required to overcome procedural motions.

However, most observers see little chance of a House-Senate agreement on a budget next year. Indeed, a battle over holdover fiscal 2011 funding is likely to confront the new Congress early on when a likely short-term funding measure that Congress is expected to clear this week expires, opening policy fights over spending for everything from implementing health care overhaul to the financial services law.

“The House and Senate may pass versions of a budget, yet that budget will never be reconciled by a conference committee,” Darling said.

Even with Democrats in control of the White House and Congress for the past two years, House leaders openly disparaged the Senate, where hundreds of House-passed bills stalled.

The much slower Senate moves far less legislation than the House in any year, but Democrats will have even fewer incentives in the new Congress to respond to House demands for Senate consideration of legislation passed by a Republican majority.
Bills Geared to the Base Are Likely

Sarah Binder, a senior fellow at the liberal-leaning Brookings Institution, said the new House Republican majority probably will act as all House majorities have: passing bills regardless of their Senate prospects. The practice enables the House majority to appeal to its base and to stake out a position for negotiations down the road with the Senate and White House.

“They will use the Rules Committee to produce bills that best reflect the House Republican caucus,” Binder said.

It will be harder for Senate Democrats, given the rules of the chamber, to use their majority to appeal to the party base or to stake out left-leaning positions ahead of negotiations, Binder said.

Darling expects both chambers to spend a good deal of time on “messaging” bills that have little to no chance of passage in the other chamber. “House Republicans will debate the issue of ‘Obamacare’ repeal, a permanent extension of tax cuts and legislation to cut spending,” Darling said. “Sen. Reid will debate union priorities like card check. . . and more money for projects in the name of stimulus.”

A wild card will be what position the White House stakes out on legislation. The extension of the 2001 and 2003 tax rates that the White House worked out with Senate Republicans this month (HR 4853) won Senate passage last week in part because of Obama’s imprimatur on it.

The White House launched a major public relations and behind-the-scenes lobbying campaign to drum up support for the measure, which Obama signed into law Dec. 17.

On the other hand, the president endorsed a House Republican proposal to ban earmarks — appropriations set aside for specific projects requested by members of Congress — in November.

But he did not press hard for its adoption in the Senate, where a Nov. 30 vote to adopt an earmark moratorium for three years garnered 39 votes, including seven from Democrats.

“Much of it depends on how active and aggressive the president is in taking a position,” Binder said.

Although gridlock is largely seen as the most frequent outcome for legislation in 2011, lawmakers in both parties say agreement could be reached on issues, including trade deals, modest energy proposals and simplifying the tax code.

“Divided government in the end does better work,” said Sen.Mark Steven Kirk, R-Ill., who worked in the State Department during the administration of President George Bush. “In every Bush meeting, the first question was, ‘Which Democrats can we get for what we want to do?’ That was very healthy.”