Aug. 4, 2022: Why the left is quiet about Manchin’s reconciliation deal

As the Senate moves onto the Inflation Reduction Act, bipartisanship is not in the cards. The two biggest obstacles remaining before Majority Leader Chuck Schumer can celebrate the best end of summer Labor Day party of his life are Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) and Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth McDonough. The latest reporting suggests that Sinema is eyeing three changes:

— Burgess Everett and Marianne LeVine scooped yesterday that Sinema wanted to (1) nix the carried interest loophole pay-for, which represents less than 2% of the financing for the bill, and (2) add some $5 billion in drought resiliency funding.

— WaPo’s Tony Romm and Jeff Stein add that Sinema also seems to be (3) questioning the bill’s corporate minimum tax, an idea she seemed to endorse last year, though “discussions are fluid” and her “exact requests are unclear.” Bloomberg and Axios also have similar stories with an equally cloudy picture of what exactly she wants to do on the corporate minimum tax. But everyone seems to agree she’s talking to a lot of Arizona business interests about the bill’s tax provisions.

Meanwhile, Caitlin Emma and Marianne Levine report that there are at least four policies in the reconciliation bill that their sources believe could be vulnerable to a Byrd Rule challenge before MacDonough, who, as Senate Parliamentarian, is the second most powerful person in Washington (after Sinema) for the next week or so.

Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook newsletter

Raghu Manavalan is the Host of POLITICO's Playbook.
Jenny Ament is the Executive Producer of POLITICO Audio.