New Republican-dominated US Congress braces for big partisan fights

 

Intense bipartisan fights are expected across the two-year 115th U.S. Congress sworn in Tuesday, which will be dominated by Republicans.

Republican lawmakers are urged to "buckle up" to lay the groundwork for incoming President-elect Donald Trump's action-packed first 100 days, while their Democratic counterparts are determined to defend outgoing President Barack Obama's legacy.

INHERENT DIVIDE

Once Trump takes oath on Jan. 20 and after new senators are sworn in on Tuesday by Vice President Joe Biden and House members by Speaker Paul Ryan, Republicans will hold the White House and both chambers of Congress for the first time since early 2007.

Republicans will have a 52-48 advantage in the Senate and a hefty 241-194 majority in the House.

Since most legislation needs 60 votes in the Senate, the republicans still have to garner bipartisan support to fulfill their major policy tasks such as reforming the immigration system, passing spending bills, raising the federal borrowing limit as well as repealing and replacing the whole package of Obamacare.

The two mainstream parties now represent very different Americans.

Eighty-seven percent of House Republicans will be white men, who only account for 41 percent of House Democrats, according to the independent Cok Political Report. Blue-collar whites living across the Rust Belt are the key force that sent Trump to the White House.

In sharp comparison, the makeup of Democrats in the two chambers is much more racially diverse and largely metropolitan, including districts in and around cities and along the two coasts of the United States.

"The white working class completely left Democrats," Josh Huder, a senior fellow with the Government Affairs Institute at Georgetown University, was quoted by a Wall Street Journal report as saying.

COMPLICATED AGENDA

Capitol Hill's January agenda, at least on the Republican side, is huge.

On the top of the GOP's to-do list will be votes to confirm many of Trump's cabinet picks and put the wheels in motion to repeal the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, which became law in 2010 and has been seen as Obama's the most important component of his domestic policy legacy.

The Senate is expected to swiftly begin vetting and holding confirmation hearings for Trump's most controversial cabinet nominees, including ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson, tapped by Trump to serve as secretary of state, and Senator Jeff Sessions as attorney general.

So far Tillerson is the only pick under the spotlight of a handful of Republicans for his close ties with Russia. Lawmakers from the two parties are also eager to know how he will tangle with Russia when dealing with hot foreign policy issues such as Syria, Iran and a recent string of cyberattacks.

As early as this week, the new Congress will hold its first vote on whether to unlock a fast-track budget process, known as "reconciliation," as the first step to dismantle Obamacare, Senator majority leader Mitch McConnell said last month.

Under the rules of "reconciliation," there is no limit on repealing the items in the law that have a direct impact on the federal budget.

Therefore, Republicans could overcome a Democratic filibuster and use the procedure to pass the repeal in the Senate with a simple majority.

However, this is not technically an official repeal and it is unclear how many items of the bill will be swiped away and what the Republicans have planned for a replacement, analysts say.

Also on the Republican agenda is the so-called "midnight rules" bill aimed to axe Obama-era regulations, enact the "REINS Act" to curb executive branch regulatory powers, cut taxes and fill a long-vacant Supreme Court seat.

There will also be debate about how to pursue investigations into alleged Russian hacking during the U.S. presidential election. Trump has dismissed it as a partisan move aimed at diluting his presidency with repeated calls to "move on," but many Republican lawmakers including prominent Senator John McCain view it as a serious threat.

BIG PARTISAN FIGHTS

Though Democrats don't have the votes to block every bit of Republican legislation, they are lining up to fight nevertheless.

One day after the new Congress takes oath, Obama will visit Capitol Hill to "discuss fighting GOP plans to repeal (Obamacare)" with House and Senate Democrats, local media reported.

Democrats are preparing an aggressive public relations campaign to highlight how Obamacare has helped the 20 million now insured because of the law, and the other benefits such as better preventive care, said the reports.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, incoming Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders announced January 15 as a national "Our First Stand: Save Health Care" day of action for advocacy groups and Democrats to criticize Republicans for working to target the health care law.

"The ball is in their (Republicans') court," Pelosi said of the looming repealing of Obamacare during a Democratic conference call on Monday. "You break it, you own it."

Democrats are also expected to make robust grillings of Trump's cabinet picks at a series of high-profile committee hearings, in an attempt to draw contrasts with Republicans on key issues including the environment and foreign policy. They are expected to fight Trump's choices such as Sessions as attorney general and Tillerson as secretary of State.

"Republicans shouldn't expect their nominees to sail through if those nominees won't provide the disclosure that past nominees provided and that senators, and the American public, deserve," Matt House, a spokesman for Schumer, told CNN.

Though any confirmation delay would just be symbolic, if Democrats use the full amount of debate time allowed under Senate rules, then a vote on each nominee that would normally take place in one or two days could stretch out a week, local analysts say. That could mean it could take months to clear through all Trump's cabinet picks, and other priorities like repealing Obamacare could also be delayed.

In this regard, the Republicans need Democrat votes in the Senate, said McConnell one day after the Nov. 8 Election Day, emphasizing that Republican lawmakers can't read their sweep as a license "to push through a strictly partisan agenda."

"I don't think we should act as if we're going to be in the majority forever," said McConnell.

source: Xinhua