News from associated
builders and contractors

On top of government funding decisions made worse, or at least more timely, by the most recent continuing resolution, the next Congress and president will face many critical issues affecting the construction industry. Those issues include the provisions set to expire in 2025 of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the drastic changes to labor and employment law made by the Biden administration, the broken immigration and worker visa system and more.

However, even before the 119th Congress begins, a two-month legislative sprint will occur in the Congressional lame duck session that could resolve much of the 118th Congress’s unfinished business.

In this lame duck session, outgoing members will be especially interested in securing legislative legacies within big bipartisan bills. Among them are:

Energy Permitting Reform

After two years of behind-the-scenes effort, Sen. Manchin, W. Va., chair of the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, along with Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., rolled out S. 4753, the Energy Permitting Reform Act of 2024, on July 22. Just 11 days later, it cleared the committee, signaling real progress.

For contractors, this legislation is welcome, as it updates and streamlines the permitting process, making it easier to get new energy infrastructure projects off the ground. Meanwhile, the House has proven capable of delivering on permitting reform legislation in the 118th Congress. The bottom line is, if the Senate can move it, the House (in theory) has the votes.

Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act Reauthorization

After the House passed the ABC-supported H.R. 6655, A Stronger Workforce for America Act, in April with a bipartisan vote of 378-26, the Senate began forming its draft Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act reauthorization bill, with which ABC has raised extensive concerns. The prospects for passing a WIOA reauthorization bill face challenges; however, with bipartisan support for the workforce development-focused bill, a last-minute compromise is possible.

Though it is yet to be seen whether the important bicameral negotiations to come between term-limited House Education and Workforce Committee Chair Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C. and likely outgoing Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chair Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. will bear fruit or die on the vine.

Nomination for the National Labor Relations Board Chair

With the U.S. Senate likely flipping to Republican control in November, the Biden administration is attempting to confirm as many of their preferred nominees and federal judges as possible. As a part of this strategy, they have sought to stack the NLRB with their preferred nominees so that regardless of the outcome of November’s elections, the next president will have a Democrat-appointed NLRB well into their four years.

Despite the fact that much of the business community led by ABC maintain strong opposition to the renomination of NLRB Chair Lauren McFerran, it is a legacy item for not only Joe Biden in his final months as president, but also likely outgoing Senate HELP Committee Chair Sanders. To that point, Sen. Sanders is pulling out all the stops—deciding to move her nomination right before the Senate left town for the August recess in a party-line, closed-door markup without ever holding a committee hearing, preventing Senators from having the opportunity to question her about her radical record.

While most of the legislative efforts passed in Congress exist in their own stand-alone bills, it will all come down to which must-pass vehicles materialize in the lame-duck session that will be robust enough to carry elective legislation, and the appetite for that will be mostly a function of how the incentives line up in the wake of the election.

In a divided government scenario where both sides will roll their share of power into the next Congress, the lame duck is probably as good as the prospects will be for the foreseeable future.

However, there are other high-stakes elections occurring in November that could complicate the remaining legislative tasks of the 118th Congress: congressional leadership elections. In the scenario of divided government, there would likely be new leaders in both chambers who won’t want their first move to be making deals with the other side.

To those who have watched this divided government operate, it is clear that the odds favor another continuing resolution into 2025, a new National Defense Authorization Act and a patch for the farm bill, and whatever other authorizations need to be dealt with—putting the lame in lame duck.