A notice from the House Majority Whip’s office indicates Republicans have no plans to hold a vote on any Senate-passed legislation to avoid the so-called fiscal cliff.
“There will be a Special GOP Conference Meeting at 5:00 p.m. in HC-5,” according to the alert. “Immediately following Conference tonight, roughly 5:30-6:00 p.m. we will have our first and only vote series of the day on suspensions.”
To translate, the House is only planning to vote on a handful of scheduled, non-controversial measures this evening. They plan to leave tonight whether or not the Senate passes a bill to avoid the expiration of the Bush tax cuts at midnight. That means that unless the GOP’s plans change, then starting at midnight, the revenue baseline resets to a pre-Bush tax cut baseline, and any fiscal cliff legislation becomes a tax cut.
The consequences for the shape of any deal are potentially huge, but still unclear.
