State of the Union

By Jack Quinn and Dave Hoppe
January 29, 2010

President Obama’s State of the Union address set out an ambitious agenda for the Congress. While the House of Representatives has already handled a number of the issues the President focused on, members of the Senate are going to be very busy meeting the goals and plans laid out in the President’s speech.

Perhaps the most significant aspect of the President’s speech was this: health care took a back seat to jobs.  While the President called for completing action on health care reform, the lack of specific recommendations left questions about completion of a comprehensive reform bill this year.   The work on health care is no longer center stage, but negotiations will be ongoing behind the scenes.   

Trying to match the requests listed in the State of the Union with the legislative calendar is always a part of the “post game show” in Washington. The President’s priorities seem to indicate that members of Congress should focus their attention in February and March on passing the health care reform bill and dual tracking that with jobs legislation. Since the discussions to finalize the healthcare bill do not take floor time in the Senate, they will be able to double track the jobs bill during these next few weeks.

Realistically, if the House is able to gather the 218 votes needed to pass the Senate health bill it will then be necessary to complete the reconciliation process with the Senate health bill. A reconciliation bill takes a week of Senate floor time and the conference report takes several days as well.

In his speech, the President laid out plans for increasing the growth of jobs in the clean energy programs that he had began to talk about last year. He also challenged the Senate to follow the lead of the House of Representatives and pass cap and trade. He also called for the Senate to finish the jobs bill passed by the House in December and suggested adding some tax incentives for small businesses.

Saying he would like to complete the job started by the House on financial services reform and cautioning the Congress that he will veto financial reform he doesn’t like was a shot across the bow of the Senate Banking Committee – where members have been holding bipartisan negotiations since November. It appears that the current schedule in the Senate would have Banking Committee action and floor action on financial services in late April and May. The clear goal is to have a bill on the President’s desk by early summer. It is too early to tell whether the President’s warning that he will only sign a bill that meets his criteria will affect that schedule.

One can expect that several of the President’s new initiatives on tax benefits for small businesses will find their way into the final jobs legislation. 

If health care and jobs are completed, the Congress will turn to the budget process and the President’s plan to freeze some budget accounts for three years. This will begin in March and probably continue in April. During this time there will also probably have to be a defense supplemental to fund Afghanistan and Iraq.

As the President pointed out in his address, the House has sent several major pieces of legislation to the Senate. This means that the House schedule allows time to move on to some of the other issues the President mentioned in his speech. Chief among these would be the President’s changes to the No Child Left Behind law. The House might also turn to legislation which limits the Supreme Court’s recent campaign finance decision. The Speaker has made it clear that the Senate will take up immigration reform first, so that would presumably not be on the list of bills the House would consider at this time.

The likely timing for the Senate to take up the cap and trade bill would be in May or June. Senators Kerry, Lieberman and Graham are working to try and find a bipartisan approach that would garner 60 votes in the Senate. There are some Democratic Senators who have questioned whether this is an issue that needs to be debated and completed during the second session of the 111th Congress. At some point, if it is not clear that there are 60 votes for a comprehensive climate bill, then the Senate might decide to move to the legislation reported out of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee last year.

The Senate could look to move an immigration bill during the summer before the August recess. It also seems likely that trade agreements would need some discussion before they would be ready for floor action in either the House or the Senate.

The appropriations bills will also take some time on the calendar this summer and into the fall.

With midterm elections scheduled for November of this year, few expect that September will see anything but mopping up on the appropriations bills. Obviously this is a very ambitious agenda for a year in which politics will overwhelm policy at some point during the summer.

About the Authors

Jack Quinn is the co-founder and chairman of Quinn Gillespie & Associates and serves as the firm's chief strategist. He has been a long-time advisor to Democratic leaders and has served as counsel to numerous Democratic campaigns. Before co-founding QGA in 2000, Jack was a partner in the Washington, D.C. law firm of Arnold & Porter where he practiced for 20 years. Jack served as Counsel to the President of the United States from November 1995 to February 1997. At the time of Jack’s appointment by President Clinton, he was Vice President Gore's Chief-of-Staff and Counselor, a position he undertook in June 1993.

David Hoppe is one of QGA’s most seasoned Capitol Hill veterans and the President of the firm. Mr. Hoppe brings nearly 30 years of experience working for senior Republican members, including six years as Chief of Staff to then-Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott. Mr. Hoppe maintains extensive contacts in the House, Senate and federal agencies.

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