Democrats Try to Back Joe Manchin Off Killing Paid Family Leave Proposal

Democratic senators tried to help centrist Sen. Manchin, who was against a national paid family leave program. He didn’t want it taken out of the budget reconciliation package. A Senate committee led by Patty Murray and Kirsten Gillibrand, two women who want to pay family leave, talked to Joe Manchin on the Senate floor. They wouldn’t give up when he said no.
Murray said that paid family leave is still in the package. Reports said it was going to get cut, but Murray insists that it is still there. Senator Manchin promised to keep an open mind about this new proposal. “I talked to him,” she said. “He will not say no. He will keep his mind open when the idea comes up again.”

Democrats in the Senate until last week mostly let Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and White House officials talk about the negotiations with Joe Manchin. But at Wednesday’s vote, Murray and Gillibrand were very persuasive to Manchin. They made him do what they wanted. It was just like Lyndon Baines Johnson from Texas, who was a famous senator before being a president.

Manchin told reporters that we should be examining all this stuff.

Democrats Try to Back Joe Manchin Off Killing Paid Family Leave Proposal (1)

But he warned that it is not a good idea to add a paid leave program in a budget reconciliation package. “We should be careful about what we do. We need to do it right,” he said. Murray said that the proposal would be modified to provide four weeks of paid family leave for people who become new parents and who already have a year on the job.

She said that the person she talked to, Joe Manchin, said that he would think about it and has an open mind. Murray said their original vision was different from the final version. Gillibrand proposed 12 weeks of paid family leave. The government would give two-thirds of a person’s wages up to $4,000 a month.

Democrats this year wanted a plan that would cost around $100 billion over ten years. They thought this would be paid for by taxing corporations and the wealthy. Democrat senators worked hard on the Senate floor to get a centrist senator, Joe Manchin, to change his opinion on a national paid family leave program. The program was going to be cut from the budget reconciliation package.

Senate Health Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand talked to Mr. Manchin on the Senate floor and tried to change his mind about the family leave bill. But he said no, so they did not stop asking him until he answered yes.

 

Murray said that paid family leave is still in the package. He said that Manchin promised to keep an open mind about it. She said that he had not made up his mind. He had an open mind and was not a no. Democrats in the Senate have been letting Schumer, a senator from New York, and White House officials lead the negotiations with Joe Manchin.

But on Wednesday, at the vote, Murray and Gillibrand were giving Manchin the full “Johnson treatment.” Johnson was a leader in the Senate. He made this type of persuasion famous. Senator Manchin said yesterday (Wednesday) that he thinks we should be looking at all of this stuff.

But he warned that it is not a good idea to put the paid-leave program in the budget reconciliation package. We need to be careful about what we are doing. If we do it, make sure that you do it right. Murray proposed a change to the proposal. The change will provide four weeks of paid family leave for workers who become new parents and have been at their job for more than a year.

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He said he would think about it. He has an open mind, she told me of Senator Manchin’s possible support for the proposal. But Murray acknowledged that this recent version of the plan is very different than the original.

Gillibrand first proposed a plan of 12 weeks of paid family leave. This would be administered by the Treasury Department or the Social Security Administration. Employees would get two-thirds of their wages up to $4,000 a month.

Democrats thought that the proposal would cost $225 billion over ten years. They think this will be paid for with higher taxes on corporations and wealthy individuals. Democrats want a program where people can take more time off of work when they have a baby. This would be done by their employer.

“It would be significant to have four weeks of paid medical leave in our country. We need to talk about this. When people go back to work, they pay into the paid leave. This is not a social program because people are paying for their own time off.”

Democrats know about the negotiation, and they want to change it back to what Gillibrand suggested before we took control of the White House and Senate. Before then, Democrats wanted a new way for federal spending like what FDR did when he became president.

Gillibrand first proposed a 0.2% tax on people’s wages, which would be split between employers and employees.

Also, Read Billionaire Tax Criticized as Biden Pushes for Budget Deal

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