Meet the most important person you don’t know.
The parliamentarian is typically a little-known person — at most, MacDonough can sometimes be spotted on C-SPAN quietly advising the Senate’s presiding officer. But when the post has become controversial in the past, it’s often been over the thorny decisions around reconciliation.
.. In 2001, Republicans fired Robert Dove as parliamentarian after he ruled against them on how many reconciliation bills could be used. That was actually his second stint in the job: Democrats had fired Dove when they took the majority in 1987.
.. Her tenure has been so free of controversy that many lawmakers interviewed said they didn’t know much about her, or even her name.
.. “I would hope and trust that her reputation is a straight shooter, because she is,” Frumin said of MacDonough. “She’s a nonpartisan professional. She listens. She’s a very good listener. And she’s very smart. And she will have possibly some difficult decisions to make, but she’s absolutely the right person to do that.”
.. “Every generation or so this comes along,” he said. “But this is what the parliamentarian does.”
Who’s Afraid of the Senate Parliamentarian?
Why is Ryancare so sick? In short, it’s a House bill written under Senate rules.
.. Under the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Act of 1974, the reconciliation process would allow Senate Republicans to avoid a Democratic filibuster and repeal and replace Obamacare with a simple 51-vote majority. Nonetheless, the House GOP-leadership bill excludes popular, important, conservative measures because Democrats might try to disqualify them for having a “merely incidental” budget impact.
.. Cruz added: “And even if the parliamentarian arrived upon that erroneous interpretation of the statutory language, the Budget Act of 1974 gives the authority to resolve this question to the vice president of the United States, Mike Pence.”
.. If a Trump-backed House bill guaranteed every illegal alien a free weekly visit to the doctor of his choice, Democrats would explode in rage: “Racists!” they would erupt. “Trump is Satan and the Republicans are his demons! Weekly medical visits? Why not daily? And how dare these Nazis deny undocumented employees the pleasure of house calls?”
.. If the parliamentarian agrees with the Democrats, however, Vice President Pence can ignore her advice and rule the bill in order. If so, Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York may attempt to overturn Pence’s decision with a three-fifths majority. Schumer would need to rally all 48 Senate Democrats and twelve Republican senators to reach 60 votes.
.. Ryancare and its discontents could demolish the prospects for securing a 60-seat, filibuster-proof GOP Senate majority. Even worse, Republicans could shrink or even sink their House majority, perhaps returning Nancy Pelosi to the speaker’s chair. It is unfathomable that two months into a unified Republican government, such a nightmare scenario is being discussed. And yet it is, all because the highly intelligent, truly diligent, and dangerously cautious Paul Ryan has fallen victim to a virus that makes him think like a Senate Democrat.