In a Friday letter, nine moderate House democrats told Speaker Pelosi that they will not vote for a budget resolution until the infrastructure bill is signed into law.
The Senate passed the infrastructure bill on Tuesday with 69 votes. It then approved early Wednesday a $3.5 trillion budget resolution that, if passed by the House, would allow democrats to assemble the social policy bill without fear of a republican filibuster in the Senate, the New York Times reports.
“With the livelihoods of hardworking American families at stake, we simply can’t afford months of unnecessary delays and risk squandering this one-in-a-century, bipartisan infrastructure package,” the letter reads. “It’s time to get shovels in the ground and people to work.”
With this considered, it appears that Pelosi lacks the votes to either deliver the infrastructure bill to Biden’s desk, or advance the budget resolution needed to protect the final legislation from republican destruction.
“We will not consider voting for a budget resolution until the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act passes the House and is signed into law,” they wrote.
The letter was signed by Reps. Gottheimer, Filemon, Cuellar, Case, Schrader, Bordeaux, Golden, Vicente, Gonzalez and Costa.