On the closing day of the 114^th Congress, the fate of the continuing resolution the Senate needed to pass to avoid a government shutdown remained unclear until late in the day.

Ultimately, the Senate voted to pass the CR by a vote of 63 to 36, with 13 Republicans voting against the temporary budget bill and 22 Democrats voting for it less than an hour before the midnight deadline.

The bill passed after a procedural vote to advance the continuing resolution, which funds the government through April 28, 2017, barely won the 60 votes needed to move the budget bill to a final vote.

Most of the day’s uncertainty came from Senate Democrats, who had threatened a government shutdown throughout the preceding week if the final CR did not include the Miners Protection Act.

That bill, which passed out of the Senate Finance Committee on an 18 to 8 bipartisan vote in the Senate Finance Committee in September, addresses the drastic funding shortfalls in the United Mine Workers of America’s health care and pension plans for retirees.

The version of the continuing resolution that passed in the House of Representatives included a provision of $45 million, which would fund the health care benefits of 16,300 retired miners until the end of April 2017. Without the provision, the miners were scheduled to lose their health care coverage on December 31, 2016.

That temporary extension of miners’ health benefits amounted to a “pathetic proposal,” said Sen. Bob Casey, D-PN, on the Senate floor.

Casey was one of a cadre of Senate Democrats led by Sen. Joe Manchin, D-WV, that announced they would be voting no on the continuing resolution late in the day, based on what they said were the paltry protections for the retired miners in the CR.

Sen. Sherod Brown, D-OH, joined Manchin and Casey in vowing to vote against the CR in support of coal miners. All three represent states with large coal mining footprints that went for President-elect Trump, and all three are up for re-election in 2018.

Sen. Chris Coons, D-DE, and Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-MO, both voted against the resolution, citing their support for the retired miners. Neither has a significant miner constituency, but McCaskill is also up for reelection in 2018.

Miners expected to get attention early in 115^th Congress

Incoming Senate Minority Leaders Charles Schumer, D-NY, vowed to make the Miners Protection Act a focus of Democrats’ platform in January, when lawmakers assemble for the 115^th Congress.

“Tonight, Mr. President, we are putting our Republican colleagues on notice,” Schumer said on the Senate floor.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, had tried to negotiate at least a year’s worth of guarantees for miners’ health benefits in the CR. “Would I have preferred the provision to be more generous? Of course I would have,” said McConnell. He vowed to work with his party to assure the benefits would not expire next April.

Randy DeFrehn, executive director of the National Coordinating Committee for Multiemployer Plans, doesn’t think the pledges from Schumer and McConnell are hollow.

“I do believe there is a commitment, and I think you will see Congress revisit the Miners bill early next year,” said DeFrehn. NCCMP advocates for the protection of collectively bargained multiemployer plans.

Coal miners’ health care and pension programs are distinct from other multiemployer pension plans, in that the benefits were guaranteed by President Truman in 1947.

The Miners Protection Act, which was first introduced by Sen. Manchin in 2015, would transfer funds from the Abandoned Mine Reclamation Fund, which is run by the Department of the Interior, to the miners’ health care fund. The bill picked up 50 co-sponsors when Manchin reintroduced the bill last Friday.

It would also make the UMWA 1974 pension solvent by increasing a custom tax. The UMWA 1974 pension fund has about $4 billion in assets and more than $9.5 billion in liabilities. All told, the Miners Protection Act raises more than $3 billion in funding for retired miners.

The Congressional Budget Office has said the bill would not negatively impact the federal budget, and that it would save the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp.’s multiemployer insurance program about $415 million.

But some conservatives in Congress have signaled concern that bailing out the coal miners would set a dangerous precedent, and open the door for more tax-payer bailouts for other multiemployer plans, like the Teamsters Central States plan.

PBGC’s latest figures show that between 10 and 15 percent of the more than 10 million workers with pensions insured by the multiemployer program are enrolled in plans expected to run out of money in the next 20 years or less. The multiemployer program covers about 1,400 collectively bargained multiemployer plans.

But despite some lawmakers’ fears, DeFrehn thinks members on both sides of the aisle will be able to separate the distinct circumstances of UMWA members from the insolvency issues of other multiemployer plans.

“The issues with the Miners’ plans, other multiemployer plans, and even underfunded public pension plans sometimes get tied together at the national policy level, but there are clear distinctions and issues in each circumstance,” said DeFrehn.

He says much of the funding issues with retired miners’ health and pension benefits relate to policies favored by Democrats. “The coal industry has been decimated by the Clean Air Act. It moved a lot of coal production to the west, where workers were not unionized,” said DeFrehn.

Both parties have used the coal industry for a political toehold, says DeFrehn: Democrats to advance clean energy policy initiatives, and President-elect Trump to win swing states with repeated pledges on the campaign trail to revive coal country.

“If you think about who came out to vote in this election, it was working people that felt they were being left out. Both parties used the miners. Both have an obligation to come back and do what they said they were going to do,” said DeFrehn.

“Congress needs to step up to the plate and do the right thing,” he added. “I am confident they will.”

Miners expected to get attention early in 115th Congress

Miners expected to get attention early in 115^th Congress

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Senate leaders vow to make good on promises to miners

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