A protester participates in a demonstration by fast food workers and supporters to commemorate the California Labor Commissioner’s order for the company to rehire and compensate workers who went on strike for protection against coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Los Angeles, California , February 18, 2021.
Lucy Nicholson | Reuters
Democrats cannot include a $ 15 an hour minimum wage in their $ 1.9 trillion coronavirus aid package, a Senate official decided on Thursday, for the time being derailing a party priority and an increase to millions of Americans.
Senate congresswoman Elizabeth MacDonough determined that lawmakers could not include the budgetary reconciliation policy, CNBC confirmed. She and her team heard arguments from Democrats and Republicans about whether the proposal met the strict deficit standards needed to include it in the process.
Reconciliation allows the Senate to pass bills with a simple majority – in this case, without Republicans who are suspicious of another big bailout package. However, Democrats faced challenges in approving the salary increase, regardless of whether house rules allow it in legislation.
House Democrats included the minimum wage of $ 15 an hour in the rescue project they plan to approve on Friday. This would increase the federal pay floor up to the limit by 2025 and then index future increases in inflation.
It is not clear now whether House leaders will change their plan before approving it and sending it to the Senate.
Democrats consider raising the minimum wage – set at $ 7.25 an hour since 2009 – a priority while controlling Congressional chambers and the White House. But while Republicans question whether a $ 15 wage floor will hurt small businesses in parts of the country, the policy will not garner 60 votes in a Senate divided by 50-50 per party.
Republican senators Mitt Romney and Tom Cotton offered a Republican response to the minimum wage increase, proposing a plan that would raise the wage floor to $ 10 an hour and place restrictions on hiring undocumented immigrants. Arkansas, the state that Cotton represents, has a minimum wage of $ 11.
Democratic leaders will reject the structure proposed by Romney and Cotton.
Democrats sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona objected to a minimum wage of $ 15 an hour. Manchin said he bet $ 11 an hour.
Raising the minimum wage to $ 15 an hour by 2025 would lift 900,000 people out of poverty, but it would cost 1.4 million jobs, estimated the Congressional Budget Office earlier this month.
– CNBC’s Ylan Mui contributed to this report
This story is developing. Please check again for updates.
Sign up for CNBC on YouTube.