Democrats have successfully obstructed the “spending Bill” in the US senate.
This was done to force the Trump administration to protect undocumented child immigration from deportation.
What is the status of the current spending bill?
USA’s “Spending Bill” is an agglomerated “Appropriation Bill” for drawing money for various budgetary allocations.
Unlike in parliamentary democracies, the failure of an Appropriation Bill doesn’t lead to the fall of the government in presidential systems such as US.
To become a law, any bill in the US will have to pass through both houses of the Congress namely – “Senate” and the “House of Representatives” and then get the assent of the president.
While the current Spending Bill sailed through the Congress with a 230-197 vote, it was blocked in the senate due to Democrat Senators.
Notably, congress has been struggling since October to pass this spending Bill, which is being held hostage due to the child immigration issue.
How does the U.S. senate work?
The US senate has 100 seats and any bill needs a majority (which is 50% + 1) of the total votes casted to get passed.
The “Republican Party” (Trump’s party) currently holds 51 seats in the senate, while the “Democrat Party” holds 47 and 2 is held by independents.
But unlike in India, there is no anti-defection law in the US and also as long as senators are engaged in debates, the bill can’t be put to vote.
Since Senate has only a limited number of working days, many a times some senators have resorted to obstructionist debates to block bills.
This practice of blocking bills is called “fillibustery” and to break this jinx a guillotine motion was commissioned.
To guillotine a debate, a three-fifth majority of those present and voting is needed, which accounts to 60 if the house votes in full attendance.
If guillotine doesn’t succeed, then a bill eventually lapses with the Senate session, which is what happened to the current spending bill.
What are the implications?
The government was till recently being funded by temporary arrangements since the new fiscal year began in October.
The current stalemate means that the government will now face a complete shutdown due to lack of funds, which has happened only thrice since 1995.
This means most “non-essential” federal workers will be put on leave, and only those dealing with public safety and national security, would continue work.
Nearly 1 million people would not receive regular pay checks, and businesses involved with the government would also stand to lose revenue.
Also, due to reduced taxes, the exchequer stands to lose $6.5bn a week, and also potentially devastating ramifications for the national economy looms.
Despite this pressing situation, Mr. Trump seems to be continuing his aggressive posture against the Democrats on the immigration issue.
