U.S. Policy

Over the course of the nearly two-year pandemic, Congress has committed more than $5 trillion toward combating the contagion. But some of the most significant programs to keep businesses afloat and help families pay their bills have expired or run out of funds, raising new risks for a fragile recovery now trying to withstand the fast-spreading omicron variant.

"I cannot vote to continue with this piece of legislation, I just can’t,” Manchin said on "Fox News Sunday," citing the impacts of rising prices, the arrival of a new coronavirus variant and other domestic and international challenges.

The stunning acknowledgment after months of negotiations — some even involving Biden personally in recent days — reflected a party struggling to overcome its own, long-simmering divides and finalize a spending proposal that has bedeviled them for months.

The change in policy marks a significant shift in how the Fed is responding to economic pressures during the coronavirus pandemic, and could affect everything from mortgages and car loans to business investments.

The sticking points include the fate the child tax credit, a Democratic priority that Manchin hopes to strip from the bill in full, sources said.

Congressional Democrats were racing to approve the measure so the Treasury Department can continue borrowing money.

The West Virginia Democrat has expressed caution about size and scope of spending package.

Prices keep climbing and the president is working to convince critics that his agenda will help, not hurt.

The compromise, which now heads to President Biden’s desk, essentially puts to rest a fierce, months-long battle between Democrats and Republicans and appears to postpone the next round of wrangling over the country’s financial health until after the 2022 midterm election.

A new federal program that provides monthly payments to an estimated 35 million families with children is set to expire at the end of December.

In their most public, forceful protest to date, Republicans muscled to passage a proposal that aims to repeal the Biden administration’s rules ordering large private businesses to require vaccination or implement comprehensive coronavirus testing for workers.

Democrats and Republicans said Tuesday they had secured a deal to raise the country’s debt ceiling.

For Manchin, the package may be too large in size and scope, it may not be financed it full, it might intensify a recent uptick in prices and it could inflict other harm on the economy, he said Tuesday at an event hosted by The Wall Street Journal.

Officials in the department’s Office of Tax Policy felt the new 15 percent minimum tax could lead to unintended consequences and prove difficult to enforce.

Writing to lawmakers on Monday, Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) affirmed the aggressive timeline, warning that there are “long days and nights, and potentially weekends,” ahead of the chamber for it to finish a fuller array of legislative legwork before the end of the year.