Comment by elictronic 8 days ago
The Republican Party is actively antagonistic to any legislation from the Democratic Party basically.
You need a 60% vote or you need to take away someone else’s pie. Medicaid/medicare/social security are current contenders based on Republican planning.
The bigger issue is Republican voting districts gain less from putting it back in place. Most software devs are on the coasts and Denver.
The "or you need to take away someone else’s pie" is the relevant part here
The 174 changes (and SALT changes, and some other stuff) were how TCJA got balanced and passed without a 60% majority. 50%+1 is enough to undo previously passed legislation that was also passed with 50%+1 in this case (handwaving - not exactly right, because the balancing point is a different time range, so the math might not work out exactly the same).
The Democratic party absolutely could have passed some legislation in 2021-2023 to undo a lot of TCJA with just a 50%+1 vote, if they cut other stuff to balance. They didn't do that though. In part because they had literally 50%+1 majority and couldn't lose a single vote in the Senate, and couldn't come to an internal agreement.
Uhm, but the Democrats held the House and Senate for two years during the Biden administration, which came after the Trump tax cuts.
I don't believe that's true. I remember gnashing of teeth about this during the Biden years.
Don’t need 60% for budget bills in reconciliation (the process of merging bills from the House of Representatives and the Senate). One of the times filibusters (which create 60% requirement) do not apply.