Early Thursday morning, the AP broke the story that the Senate will have to return the reconciliation bill back to the House. The Senate Parliamentarian Alan Frumin ruled that "two provisions, dealing with Pell grants for low-income college students, will have to be removed from the bill."
BBC News reported that Jim Manley, the spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, explained:
"After hours of trying to find a way to block this, they (Republicans) found two relatively minor provisions that are violations of Senate procedure which means we're going to have to send it back to the House."
The Senate Democrats were hoping to avoid having to send the reconciliation bill back to the House for another vote and had easily defeated every amendment offered by the obstructing Republicans in a marathon voting session that began at 5 p.m. EDT on Wednesday.
The Hill reported a defeated Senate Republican Whip Jon Kyl said the ruling was "a consolation prize".
As of 3 a.m. Thursday, the chamber had defeated 29 straight Republican proposals and adopted none...
The evening’s mood suggested a foregone conclusion; Republicans privately conceded that the bill was on its way to passage and said they weren’t surprised at the overwhelming defeat of their amendments.
The NY Times added that the Senate Parliamentarian is reviewing a third issue.
A Senate Democratic aide said the one of the provisions in question involved changes to the Pell grant program, which is part of an education section in the reconciliation bill. The provision would prevent reductions in the amount of Pell grants for students from low-income families as a result of a decrease in money appropriated for the program by Congress...
Senator Kent Conrad, Democrat of North Dakota and chairman of the Budget Committee, said that one problem with the bill was the formula for determining the maximum Pell grant award under an expansion of the program.
The second issue was a technical matter that Mr. Conrad described as mostly insignificant.
Mr. Conrad said a third issue was under review by the Senate parliamentarian...
“We see no impact on the score and very insignificant impact on any policy,” Mr. Conrad said. “This is not going to be a problem.”
Sen. Conrad predicts the Senate will be done with reconciliation at 2 p.m. EDT on Thursday, but, of course, this now has to go back to the House.
Ryan Grim at the Huffington Post reported the Republicans found two minor 'flaws' with the reconciliation bill that violated the Byrd Rule..
Neither [flaw] is of any substance, but the Senate parliamentarian informed Democratic leaders that both are in violation of the Byrd Rule.
One is related to Pell Grants and the other makes small technical corrections. Why they're in violation of the Byrd Rule doesn't matter; the upshot is that Republicans will succeed in at least slightly altering the legislation, which means that the House is once again required to vote on it...
After the Parliamentarian Alan Frumin had advised the leadership of his ruling, the Democratic and Republican leaders huddled on the Senate floor and agreed to adjourn until 9:45 a.m...
"The Parliamentarian struck two minor provisions tonight from the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act, but this bill's passage in the Senate is still a big win for the American people. These changes do not impact the reforms to the student loan programs and the important investments in education. We are confident the House will quickly pass the bill with these minor changes," said a statement from Kate Cyrul, a spokeswoman for Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa).
Marc Ambinder at The Atlantic noted that Vice President Biden "could could overrule the parliamentarian, but that's never been done, and given the teensy-weensy provisions that need to be changed, there's no reason for him to do so."
Politico added that according to Manley, Reid's spokesman, the provisions in question "made technical changes to the bill's Pell Grant regulations. All told, 16 lines of text will be removed from the 153-page bill".
David Herszenhorn at the Prescriptions blog at the NY Times explained how the first inkling that something went wrong came about when, at 2:27 a.m. EDT, Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) said from the Senate floor: "This reconciliation bill is already going back to the House."
While Vitter was offering his admendent, "Senate leaders from both parties are conferring animatedly on the floor, indicating that something is afoot — apparently something related to two minor education provisions."
Before being tripped up by the Byrd Rule, the Democrats had done well, beatting back every obstructionist amendment offered by the Republican minority, or as the Washington Post put it: GOP amendments to health-care reconciliation bill fail.