Senate Republicans on Thursday blocked an amendment to the GOP budget that called for increasing the minimum wage.



The amendment offered by Sen. Bernie Sanders Bernie SandersNYT editorial board remembers Ginsburg: She 'will forever have two legacies' Two GOP governors urge Republicans to hold off on Supreme Court nominee Sanders knocks McConnell: He's going against Ginsburg's 'dying wishes' MORE (I-Vt.) failed in a 48-52 vote.



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The amendment would have created a deficit neutral reserve fund, essentially a budgetary placeholder, that "promoted a substantial increase in the minimum wage."It did not specify how high the federal minimum wage, which now sits at $7.25, should be raised."Since 1968, the real value of the federal minimum wage has fallen by close to 30 percent," Sanders, who is considering a 2016 presidential bid, said ahead of the vote. "Let us stand today with the tens of millions of workers who are struggling to put food on the table, to take care of their families. Let us raise the minimum wage."Sen.(R-Wyo.), the chairman of the Budget Committee, said that the budget wasn't the place for Sanders's amendment.

"This isn’t the proper place for this, it can be done as regular legislation at any time," he said.

The Wyoming Republican called the minimum wage the “training wage."