Posted on 12/06/21
| News Source: FOX News
The Senate is set to vote this week on a resolution to nullify President Biden's vaccine mandate for private companies, as Republicans and at least one Democrat push back on the administration's rule requiring vaccines or inconvenient testing rules for workers at large businesses.
All 50 Senate Republicans, led by Sen. Mike Braun, R-Ind., backed a challenge to the vaccine mandate last month under the Congressional Review Act (CRA). That law allows Congress to officially disapprove of an executive branch regulation via a resolution passed through each chamber.
Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said last week he also supports the Braun resolution.
"I do not support any government vaccine mandate on private businesses," Manchin said Thursday after voting against an amendment to a government funding bill that would roll back public and private vaccine mandates. Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, and a handful of other Republicans forced that vote in exchange for expediting passage of the funding bill, but they got no Democrat support.
Republicans also think Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., may vote for the Braun resolution. She declined to say whether she will vote for it in an interview with CNN last week. Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., is also pushing his Democrat counterpart from Montana, Sen. Jon Tester, to "join[] me in my efforts to block all of Biden's mandates."
The Braun resolution only needs a simple majority to pass the Senate, which means the bill will likely succeed. Rep. Fred Keller, R-Pa., is leading companion legislation in the House of Representatives, which his office said Friday has 206 cosponsors. But House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said Friday it is unlikely the bill could come for a vote in the House with Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., in charge.
"The challenge is how you bring it up on the floor," he told reporters. "We're not in the majority. We don't control it."
Even if Republicans and potentially a handful of Democrats manage to force a House vote on the CRA resolution, such resolutions are subject to a presidential veto. And it's highly unlikely Biden would sign a bill canceling a rule he ordered his administration to make.