Parliamentarian: COVID-19 bill must lose minimum wage hike
It will force Democrats to make politically painful choices about what to do next on the federal minimum wage, which has long caused internal party rifts. The proposal would gradually raise the federal minimum wage to $15 over five years, well over the $7.25 in effect since 2009. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona have voiced opposition to including the minimum wage hike in the relief bill, and other moderates have expressed concerns, too. But they’d still face the challenge of garnering 60 Senate votes, a hurdle that has upended Democratic attempts to boost the minimum wage for over a decade. But those same Senate rules prohibit provisions with only an “incidental” impact on the federal budget because they are chiefly driven by other policy purposes.