PoliticusUSA is news you can trust to be here for you, and your support makes our coverage possible, so please consider becoming a subscriber.
The Byrd Bath process has begun, and Senate Democrats have already scored a major victory. The Byrd Bath is a process where reconciliation legislation is submitted to parliamentarians if the legislation follows the rules for the reconciliation process. Democrats have brought more than 60 challenges against pieces of the legislation.
If the parliamentarian rules that a part of the tax cuts for the rich bill does not comply with the rules for reconciliation, the basic rule is that all parts of the bill must be budget-related; the non-related parts must be removed.
House Republicans tried to use the tax cut legislation to kill the CFPB.
Senate Democrats challenged the provision, and they won.
Senate Minority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer said in a statement:
Senate Republicans just tried to eliminate the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau — and Senate Democrats stopped them.
Senate Democrats stood up for common sense and for the millions of Americans who rely on strong consumer protections. We’re not done — and we’ll keep fighting this “Big, Beautiful Betrayal” like hell to protect American families, not billionaires and big corporations.
Let’s be clear: the CFPB has returned over $21 billion to American consumers by holding big banks and predatory lenders accountable. Republicans’ attempt to gut it was nothing more than a gift to the wealthy and well-connected, at the expense of working families.
Democrats will win some of these challenges, and they will get rid of some bad parts of this bill, and one of the pieces that I suspect will be gone is the provision that basically allows Trump to ignore court orders. The provisions involving the courts have nothing to do with the budget, so they should not be in the bill.
Most of the Banking Committee’s provisions in the legislation have been tossed out of the bill.
The problem with the House passing a 1,100-page wish list to get enough votes to squeak the bill through is that a lot of this junk had nothing to do with the budget. There are going to be a lot of changes to this bill before it goes back to the House, and whether or not it can survive will determine the fate of Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill.”
What do you think of Senate Democrats saving the CFPB? Let’s discuss it in the comments below.
