Major spending bills can pass the Senate by simple majority through budget reconciliation, a process that limits Senate debate and excludes non-budgetary provisions. Reconciliation gives a 51-vote majority an avenue to enact tax and spending changes when normal legislation would die at the 60-vote filibuster threshold.
Congress used reconciliation in August 2022 to enact the Inflation Reduction Act, which extended the solar and wind tax credits, created tax credits for stand-alone storage and domestic battery manufacturing, funded a $20 billion Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, and authorized billions for home efficiency rebates. The law passed 51-50 with Vice President Kamala Harris breaking the tie after Senator Joe Manchin negotiated permitting promises.
Reconciliation laws are durable but not invulnerable. Future Congresses can amend tax credits, and an administration can refuse to obligate or can claw back grant funds — moves the second Trump administration tested in 2025 by freezing IRA-funded programs and terminating the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund.
The IRA put the federal government in the business of subsidizing clean-energy buildout at a scale that rivals the original New Deal. Whether those subsidies survive directly shapes electricity prices, manufacturing jobs, and U.S. emissions trajectories through 2030.
People often think the IRA was mainly an anti-inflation bill. In practice, the bulk of its fiscal impact funds climate and clean-energy programs, and the inflation framing was a political branding choice tied to reconciliation rules.
The IRA put the federal government in the business of subsidizing clean-energy buildout at a scale that rivals the original New Deal. Whether those subsidies survive directly shapes electricity prices, manufacturing jobs, and U.S. emissions trajectories through 2030.
People often think the IRA was mainly an anti-inflation bill. In practice, the bulk of its fiscal impact funds climate and clean-energy programs, and the inflation framing was a political branding choice tied to reconciliation rules.