Every Democrat in the House voted Friday to pass the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) over unified Republican opposition, sending the multibillion-dollar climate, health and tax bill to President Joe Biden’s desk to be signed into law.
The package, which similarly passed the Senate on Sunday along party lines, was approved around 6 p.m. by a 220-207 vote.
House Democrats were seen celebrating what they are sure to support as a legislative achievement — which aims to make prescription drugs and health insurance cheaper while raising taxes on the wealthy, reducing the deficit, investing in clean energy and curbing climate change — ahead of a contentious midterm cycle when they will face the president’s low approval ratings and other headwinds.
Biden soon tweeted his reaction to the House passage: “Today the American people won. Special interests were lost.”
“With the passage of the House Inflation Reduction Act, families will see lower prescription drug prices, lower health care costs and lower energy costs,” he wrote, and said he plans to sign the bill next week.
Full party unity in both chambers is a major feat for the Democratic leadership, which has struggled for months to unite the group around a cohesive strategy. The party has been trying since Biden took office in January 2021 to pass a welfare spending bill that eventually became the IRA, a much-scaled-down version of the multi-trillion dollar plan that Biden first supported.
The more than $700 billion package includes the nation’s largest investment in new climate initiatives; allows Medicare to negotiate prices for certain drugs; and expands Affordable Care Act subsidies while reducing the federal deficit with a 15 percent corporate tax floor and an excise tax on corporate stock buybacks.
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi speaks at her weekly news conference on Capitol Hill, August 12, 2022 in Washington, DC
Mariam Zuhaib/AP
Regardless of the name of the legislation, Republicans said, it would have only a modest effect on inflation in the near term, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found.
But the CBO said it would reduce federal budget deficits by $102 billion over 10 years.
At a news conference ahead of the vote, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was asked whether the bill could actually tame high but slightly cooling inflation in the coming months.
“Well, you have to start,” Pelosi said, noting that inflation is caused by many factors, such as the COVID-19 supply chain crisis and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy on Friday called the bill “flawed” and “tone deaf.” He spoke on the House floor about 50 minutes before the vote, mostly blasting the widespread use of proxy voting to pass the bill and enhanced IRA tax enforcement measures that supporters say will actually target the wealthy who avoid their tax bills.
“Democrats, more than any other majority in history, are addicted to spending foreign money,” McCarthy said.
More than half of the House voted by proxy, which extended the bill’s passage by designating a designated member to vote in person on behalf of absent lawmakers.
The IRA passed the Senate on Sunday without a single Republican supporter. Vice President Kamala Harris cast the deciding vote after a 16-hour “frame vote” that saw multiple amendments proposed by both parties — and saw Senate Democrats forced to make last-minute adjustments to the bill’s tax provisions.
The exterior of the White House from the North Lawn, August 7, 2022 in Washington, DC
Sarah Silbiger/Getty Images
On Monday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer called the IRA “one of the most comprehensive pieces of significant legislation that has passed through the Senate and Congress in decades.”
“While much of D.C. was focused on the Senate vote earlier this week, the White House was just as focused on the House at the same time,” a White House official told ABC News, noting that the administration has been in contact with the leadership of the House throughout the week.
Staff also spoke with individual members about the legislation, answering any questions and sending out materials daily, the official said.
Since his summer vacation on Kiawah Island, South Carolina, Biden has twice held a video conference with his staff who worked for the IRA, according to the White House.
“The President has been calling members of the House all week; we had members at the CHIP signing and the PACT Act signing, which was another opportunity for POTUS to reach out to IRA members,” the official said. “White House staff also worked hard to rebut Republican attacks on the bill and to take offense at which the Republicans opposed.
ABC News’ Justin Gomez, Molly Nagle and Trish Turner contributed to this report.
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