Macdonough

After weeks of consultations with the parliamentarian—Elizabeth MacDonough, aka “the Hammer,” as insider publications call her—Senate Republicans decided this week that they didn’t actually need her to greenlight this after all.

The current Senate parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, ruled in 2021 that a provision to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour couldn’t be passed via reconciliation, despite the fact that such a change would have dramatic effects on the federal budget.

In other areas, like the question of the debt limit, MacDonough and other parliamentarians have acted more as literalists, according to Kogan.

For example, MacDonough has said that the debt limit can be raised via reconciliation, but cannot be suspended because the 1974 Budget Act does not specifically mention suspending the debt limit but does mention raising it.

While MacDonough has served during both Republican and Democratic majorities, she was first appointed to her position under the late Sen. Harry Reid’s, D-Nev., leadership.