2010 Unemployment Extensions - Will UI Extensions Pass This Week?

2010 Unemployment Extensions - At long last, the Senate will reconvene after a too-long 4^th of July Holiday recess. The upper chamber adjourned on Wednesday, June 30, without passing unemployment benefit extensions, leaving millions of jobless Americans to struggle without the desperately needed lifeline.

Before leaving for the 12 day holiday, the Senate fell just one vote short of cloture on a Democrat version of the bill that finally separated unemployment extensions from most of the other provisions of the greater H.R. 4213 "American Jobs and Closing Tax Loopholes Act of 2010". Disagreement over numerous provisions of that broader bill had contributed to the delay in getting UI benefits passed.

Unfortunately, cloture for the newly bifurcated UI Extension semi-standalone bill still failed by just one vote due to the passing of Senator Robert Byrd (D-W. Virg.) earlier that week.

The House of Representatives also passed a standalone emergency unemployment extension bill on July 1, but the Senate had already gone on recess and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev) chose not to call an emergency session at that time, as the vote was likely to meet the same fate as the Senate's version until Senator Byrd could be replaced after the recess.

Determined to add to the deficit, Reid and the Democrats had a number of Republican options that they could have accepted to get unemployment benefits extensions to the jobless, but chose to wait for the Byrd replacement rather than consent to either using unallocated stimulus funds or spending cuts from their own bloated budgets to pay for the extensions as the Republicans suggested. (Read: "Senator Coburn's Suggestions for Offsets")

So the unemployed have had to wait, with the expectation that Byrd's stand in would be in place by Monday, July 12. In the mean time, hundreds of thousands more lost benefits. As of today, over 2 million jobless have been reported to have stopped receiving their UI checks, many of them since early June.

Unfortunately, the process of replacing Senator Byrd was complicated by legal uncertainties and political considerations in the state of West Virginia. At this time, the state attorney general has affirmed that a special election for the seat can go forward in November, thus allowing the Governor to go ahead with the temporary appointment. However, to avoid the potential of any future challenges, Governor Joe Manchin (D) is waiting for the approval of the state legislature before making the appointment.

This emergency session of the legislature is currently scheduled for Thursday, July 15 at noon. While there is some remote possibility that the Governor could appoint someone sooner as he is said to be conferring with election attorneys to determine whether he could appoint an interim successor for the Byrd seat before the legislature meets, it is widely believed he will likely wait until after the Thursday session to make the appointment.

This means that there will be no replacement for Byrd until late Thursday or Friday at the earliest. Early next week is more likely. Most recently, the Senate was able to swear in a new Senator within about 48 hours of his arrival, so it is most likely that the 60^th vote needed for the Democrats' version of the unemployment extension bill will not be there until Monday or Tuesday of next week, at the earliest.

This is another week of waiting and suffering for the unemployed. With families needing to be fed, utilities being turned off, landlords evicting and lenders foreclosing, all while two million American jobless wait on these political gyrations.

The other option that Senate Majority Leader Reid (D-Nev) has is to break down and bring one of the Republican unemployment extension bills to the floor for a vote TODAY. The Republicans have offered and fully supported a number of bills and amendments which fully pay for UI extensions using common sense spending cuts and unallocated "stimulus" funds. They included the $25 per week in unemployment additions that the Democrats later cut and one bill even extended UI benefits extensions through the end of the year, rather than just through November, as the Democrats are working for. But the Democrats and Harry Reid have rejected all Republican offers for full extensions as well as numerous offers of temporary one and two month extensions to prevent the unemployed from suffering while the Senate wrangled. All have been turned down by the Democrats.

Just prior to the final failed vote on the Democrat UI extension bill on June 30, Senator Scott Brown (D-Mass.) provided a fully paid for unemployment extension bill that had full support of the Republicans but Reid did not choose to bring it to the floor for a vote. Senator George Voinovich (R-Ohio) even offered a compromise - that he would provide the 60^th vote necessary for cloture on the Democrats' unemployment extension bill if they would allow just half of the unemployment extensions to be paid for using stimulus monies the Democrats had already agreed to use for other provisions in the broader "Tax Extenders" bill. Still, Harry Reid and the Democrats have flatly refused to pay for unemployment benefits, so they can can continue to politically capitalize on the issue by demonizing the Republicans, claiming they are against unemployment benefits. (Read: "Extensions NOT Hinging on Byrd Replacement" and "Democrats Refuse Another Republican UI Bill")

So, unless Harry Reid and the Democrats determine that they care more about the unemployed than continuing their political games, it is likely that we will not see a vote on unemployment extensions until next week. The Republicans, while concerned about the unemployed, are also concerned about job creation and the overall state of our nation. Continuing to increase the deficit unnecessarily is detrimental to both, so they are unlikely to cave in. It will be up to Reid to do what's best for the unemployed and the nation and to put up for a vote a paid-for unemployment benefits extension, or to at least accept Voinovich's compromise and pay for half of the extension. If he doesn't, we will likely have to continue to suffer another week. For hundreds of thousands, that may be a week too long to prevent them from ending up on the street.

Contact Harry Reid and tell him to accept a Republican alternative and get unemployment extensions passed NOW. No more demagoguing. No more demonizing. No more delays. Tell him to just pass a paid for or partially paid for UI benefits extension bill, so America's jobless can live to fight another day.

Sources:

http://all247news.com/unemployment-extension-benefits-what%E2%80%99s-it-like-at-the-coal-face/1401/

http://www.opencongress.org/articles/view/1970-Manchin-Holding-Off-on-Picking-Interim-Byrd-Replacement