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Welcome back to the fifty five KRC Morning Show. Bradley J.
Bright, Bart's deputy news director and former Capitol Hill staff or bookmarket b R E I T b a art dot com. You'll thank me for doing so. Welcome back, Bradley J. It's always a pleasure talking with you, Brian.
It's great to be with you. Like going on in Washington, for.
Sure, Yeah, there is, you know, if you're a betting man, and we'll dive into some of the details of what's going on there. But they're still bickering over the amendments in the Senate. We don't have agreement among the Republicans, and obviously the Republicans are apparently setting up to be their own worst nightmare.
If you're a betting man right now, do you think this thing's gonna actually pass.
Oh gosh, you put me on the spot right at the beginning. But I do think it's going to pass. I think they're going to find a way. It's going to be rocky. Right now. There appear to be four holdouts in the Senate for Republican holdouts, they can only lose three, so they're trying to entice a couple to switch over. Will they be able to do it? What will it take. We're already twenty three hours into this amendment voter rama, so there's been a lot of drama.
Most of it has taken place off camera in those smoke filled back rooms of the Senate, but it is It is tense, there's no doubt.
Well and what really bothers me, and this is when people's political stripe is truly revealed. Lisa Murkowski, for example, from Alaska. One of the things she's complaining about is one of the obstructionists on this thing moving forward is the medicaid and nutritional assistance cuts in the bill. And also she's pushing for slower phase outs of clean energy
tax credits. That's the part that irks me. You'd think the Republicans will uniformly embrace the idea of phasing out those clean energy tax credits because it's a big boondoggle. I mean, those energy companies wouldn't exist but for the tax credits anyway, Who wouldn't be chasing our tail trying to pursue a carbon neutral world, which is impossible. I mean, your your thoughts on the energy tax credits alone, Bradley.
Well, they say there are three political parties in DC, Republicans, Democrats, and appropriators. Lisa Murkowski is an appropriator. Her entire government philosophy is what can I do to bring home as much bacon to Alaska and to please my donors. When Biden passed those Green New Deal tax credits and actually started handed him out, he was very smart. He gave maybe around two thirds of them out in Republican states,
and it's I mean, it's a golden handcut. You get these, you would think conservative states and a lot of conservative politicians addicted to that federal money and they don't want to give it up. Murkowski definitely falls in that camp. Look, this is a mature industry. We've been subsidizing wind and solar for decades and it still isn't viable. The technology isn't there, and most of the technology now comes from China. We need to get rid of that. Murkowski needs to get on board.
Amen to that. Brother couldn't argue with that on that point. And you know, I go from the philosophy. You know, great ideas don't need coercion, and much in the same way, great ideas don't need tax credits. If it's a good idea, you're going to pursue it because it's in your best interest. And this is clearly not a direction we would normally go in.
One of the.
Things that may happen if they lose in more than one senator and you find yourself in a position where the bill can't pass, you can buy Senator Ran Paul back if you get rid of the five trillion dollar debt seal increased. I had seen that as a suggestion of what might happen today.
Is that possible?
In your eye, it's a possibility. Trump will be livid. The Democrats would have so much leverage for the rest of the year, particularly in funding the government, which we are going to have to do in some fashion before the end of the fiscal year at the end of September. So it would be so beneficial if Republicans could actually get this off the table right now through the midterms. Now, most Republicans disagree with the Congressional Budget Office, which I've
written about. It just has a long history of promoting Democrat objectives and belittling Republicans and just being totally wrong on all its budgetary projections. But a lot of Republicans think that despite what the CBO says about the deficits in this bill, that because of Trump's tariffs, we're actually going to see the economy grow significantly. Uh So the debt the debt limit will not be as big of a deal as it has been in the past. Uh But look, the bottom line is they've got to find
a way to get this done. You have to secure the borders. Uh or and and and do all this other stuff to protect the country or else we're not even the deaths it won't even matter. What what What does their deficit matter if you've turned into a third world country. Uh So I think that because of everything that's in this bill, immigration, border security, opening up energy, uh what it does on taxes, goodness gracious. Uh, I think that they've got to find a way to get
this done. Uh preferably by extending the debt limit a little bit further. But we'll see if they have to uh do that to get Paul on board. Ideally not I think that they'll be able to get Murkowski on board.
Well, I'm glad you bought up the CBO scoring and I agree with your your criticians of the cb CB. I don't understand. It's like the alchemy, your piece god to me. I don't know how they're able to project ten years hence you know what this is ultimately going
to be by way of financial impact. But one of the things I heard by way of criticism is that, at least as I understood it, and Bradley Jay, if you could help me, and if I'm misunderstanding it, the CBO is viewing the extension of the Trump tax cuts as part of the problem. In other words, we're not bringing as much money as we would had the twenty
seventeen tax cuts not been a part of it. So they're viewing it from the lens of pre twenty seventeen taxing levels and assigning debt to the reduced levels that we are currently enjoying right now. Is that's have some measure of accuracy in your mind baseball on what I've read or how I'm recollecting it.
Well, a lot of the discussion right now, and Democrats lost this battle. It was the first vote that was taken during this voter rama on how the bill would be scored. The twenty seventeen tax credits are set to expire at the end of this year. When you are scoring the rest of that year, or excuse me, when you're you're scoring throughout the rest of the ten year window, do you make the assumption that those tax credits would
have been extended. That's what a lot of Republicans are saying, right They say, you need to look at the the political practicalities of this, and Republicans were never going to let a lot of those tax credits a fire. That's what Republicans are arguing. The cbo UH disagrees with that, but but the bottom line is that it is in the law that the Budget Committee chairman has the discretion to choose how it is scored. This, I mean, the
Republicans and Democrats have have done this before. So it's just one more thing that Democrats are finding to pitch a fit about. It is nice to see Democrats actually worried about debt deficit however, disingenuous. Uh, but but they lost that battle and we're marching on. That's pretty funny.
I have you laugh, literally out loud when I see the checky shumers of the world screaming about how this increases the hole we've dug ourselves in thus far by three point three trillion dollars and he's complaining about It's like, wait a second, when did he become a deficit hawk?
It's like it's comical.
Yeah, I mean they just were just a few years away from them passing as the inflation reduction Yeah, remember that one, the one that fueled incredible record inflation we hadn't seen since the Jimmy Carter era. Give me a break, these guys have no credibility at all on this issue.
Now, Bradley Jay in terms of is this going to end up being because we're not cutting a huge chunk out of the government spending. I mean, if we're talking about any increase in the deficit, then we're not cutting enough because we have a spending problem. I would like to see, you know, every turn and you know, maybe lower spending so we don't have a hole being dug at all.
Now.
Elon Musk commented about this, He called you the porky big Party, the uniparty. He's planning on launching his own America Party if this thing passes this are are we missing an opportunity here to cut more? Or is he just he outside of the box of reality because this is not about discretionary spending. It can't be or wouldn't be part of the reconciliation process. So all the DOGE work on discretionary spending, as legitimate as it was, couldn't
be addressed in this bill anyway. But could they cut more?
Bradley, look, you know your stuff. You're exactly right. This bill deals with mandatory spending. It's a reconciliation bill. They're constraints on it. That's why you don't have to that's why it's not subject to the filibus to that sixty vote majority. At only need fifty votes. This is mandatory spending. In the appropriations process, we can start enacting a lot of those DOGE cuts. That's where we can really take the meat. Actsis some things, but we're very limited in
how we can use reconciliation. It deals with spending in revenue, but we can't really enact these sweeping policy changes in it. Now, as I mentioned earlier, we have appropriations bills we have to pass before the end of the fiscal year at the end of September. The House has already passed one recisions package. It's been held up in the Senate by surprise, surprise, Appropriations Chairwoman Susan Collins. We'll see what happens next week if they can amend that and get it through the Senate.
If so, we'll see further recisions package. Just today there's some news rough Vote is making a renewed effort to set up doing pocket recisions, which is basically where you send a recisions package right before the end of the fiscal year, and if Congress doesn't act on it, you just deem the recisions package and acted. There's also impoundment. There's going to be a court battle when Trump, I think inevitably does that. But Trump can just say, you
know what, I'm the chief executive. I don't have to spend this money. So there are many other ways that we can we can do these, We that we can find spending cuts, and there's a talk of doing more reconciliation bills beginning in the fall. So there are more bikes at the apple that we can get, and that's gonna be a key part of Trump's argument to a lot of these spending hawks in passing this bill before the Senate today.
All right, let's assume for the sake of discussion today, Bradley, Jay, that does pass in the Senate. Uh, it's fate in the House because there is another critical vote over in the House on this thing.
How do you see that going.
It's gonna be tough, There's no question about it. Again, I think, because we'll have these other opportunities to cut some of the discretionary spending, a lot of the spending hawks will get on board. Keep it on. We don't know what this bill will look like right Still a few more Senate amendments on Medicaid and on those Green New Deal subsidies that we are likely to see probably
this morning. But the House is getting ready. The House Rules Committee is meeting, well, it's supposed to meet today at noon, assuming the Senate has passed the bill by then. They're teeing up the first procedural vote tomorrow morning at nine am. There is going to be some intense pressure on some of these holdouts but look, Trump's been able to get it done so.
Far, Yes he has.
Now, I hope cooler heads prevail, you know, And honestly, if you're an elected official from a state liking Lisa Murkowski and you want to cut the Medicaid and she doesn't, of course, you know, make the argument to your people. You know, I went ahead and I signed on to it in spite of the cuts them Medicaid because it never should have been expanded in the first place. You got able bodied adult people who are capable of working on a program that was not designed to help them
because they aren't on life's margins. You know, it's like, sorry, you know, we're gonna have to pare it back our Medicaid spending in this but it's good for the American taxpayer generally speaking, and it cuts it a large chunk of spending from the federal government. So in the final analysis, we're all going to benefit from it.
Brian, you nailed it. I couldn't have said it any better. At some point, these politicians who've been in office for longer than some of us have been alive, need to put the actual needs of their country before their political needs. But look, this is Washington. We don't see a lot of that unfortunately.
Bradley J.
Right Bart, Deputy news director and former Capitol Hill staffer. It's always a pleasure to having on the program again. Remind my listeners to bookmark the site brightbart dot com so they can enjoy what you read and the rest of the wonderful reporting, fresh good reporting, and the reporting on things that you don't read in the mainstream media. Keep up the great work, Brad. I look forward to talking with you again real soon to say hi to
the team for me. We'll do always great being with you, Bron. Take care brother eight nineteen fifty five care Ce the talk station and Daniel Davis deep dive situation not looking good for Ukraine. We'll hear about hear from Daniel Davis on that, plus his assessment of what's going on with Ron in Israel. After I mentioned, well, no, I'm done, I got to I spent a couple of minutes here hold on, be right back after these brief words.
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