Airport Alert: House Budget Committee Approves Multi-Trillion Dollar Reconciliation Package

September 25, 2021 

In a rare Saturday session, the House Budget Committee met this afternoon and favorably reported on a 20-17 vote a nearly 2,500 page, multi-trillion dollar reconciliation package that assembles a wide array of tax and spending proposals from 13 separate House Committees, including the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee. The vote was party-line with the exception of Democrat Scott Peters of California, who voted against the measure. 

As we have reported, the House Transportation Committee piece of the reconciliation package totaled $60 billion, including $1 billion to DOT to "support investments for projects that develop, demonstrate, or apply low-emission aviation technologies or produce, transport, blend or store sustainable aviation fuels (SAF)." The Ways and Means portion includes a long-term refundable blenders tax credit for SAF, along with plans to reinstate Build America Bonds and advance refunding bonds, which could help airports finance infrastructure projects.

House leadership has indicated that they would like to bring the reconciliation bill to the House floor for consideration some time next week, which looks incredibly optimistic at the moment given ongoing, public spats between moderates and progressives in the House and Senate over the size and scope of a reconciliation package. As you will recall, all congressional Republicans are opposed to the measure, which means Democrats will have to have virtual unanimity in the House and Senate to pass the massive legislation. Senate Democratic leaders have yet to announce how they intend to proceed to consideration of reconciliation legislation on the Senate floor.

As you know, the majority of the airport priorities we have been working on this year are included in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill (BIB), which was approved by the Senate in early August. House moderates have been pushing House leadership to take up and pass the BIB since that time. To appease those lawmakers and to ensure that they don't abandon reconciliation legislation, House leaders promised to hold a vote on the BIB by Monday, September 27. While a House vote on the BIB could occur on Monday, progressives have indicated that they will not vote in favor of the legislation before the reconciliation bill is passed by the House and Senate. Only a handful of House Republicans are expected to vote for the BIB. The linking of those two bills has been and remains a difficult challenge for Democratic leaders in both the House and Senate.

In addition to uncertainty on infrastructure and the reconciliation package, lawmakers before Thursday – the last day of the current fiscal year – must figure out a way of keeping the federal government operating through a continuing funding resolution. They must also soon avert a crisis related to the federal debt limit ceiling. The next few weeks could be a bumpy ride, so stay tuned for further updates and calls to action.