Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell slammed the bill as an “ideological spending spree packed with non-COVID-related costs.”
The Senate’s progress on the bill slowed to a crawl Thursday after Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., forced a reading of the entire 628-page legislation. The entire process took nearly 11 hours and did not conclude until the early hours of Friday morning.
"I can't imagine that's anyone's idea of a good time,” Schumer said, thanking the Senate staff, calling them the “unsung heroes” of the evening.
"As for our friend from Wisconsin, I hope he enjoyed his Thursday evening,” he said of Johnson.
The Senate was originally set to begin 20 hours of debate on the bill Friday, but at the end of Thursday’s session, Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., motioned for the chamber to reduce the debate time to three hours. With few Republicans left in the chamber shortly after 2 a.m. ET on Friday, Van Hollen succeeded.
Johnson said he was still in the chamber at the end of the session and was aware of Democrats' plan to change the amount of debate time.
"I stuck around to the very end to make sure they didn’t try to pull a fast one on us," Johnson said.
Once debate on the bill concludes, senators are expected to begin a period in which any member can introduce non-debatable amendments to the legislation. Republicans plan a flurry of votes during the period, dubbed a “vote-a-rama,” on controversial topics like abortion, the reopening of schools, and immigration.
— Nicholas Wu
Debate on the bill was scheduled to begin Thursday after Vice President Kamala Harris, in her role as president of the Senate, broke a 50-50 tie to move the bill forward.
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