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It is not an unprecedented situation. As recently as 2017, Republicans went it alone on their Trump-era tax cuts using the budget reconciliation process, which shields legislation from a filibuster, knowing that Democrats would not support the corporate tax breaks the G.O.P. was eagerly handing out. In 2009 and 2010, Democrats had substantial enough majorities in the Senate and the House that they could enact the Affordable Care Act on their own over universal Republican resistance.

Aware that Republicans would never support the kinds of social and climate programs they are trying to enact in the safety net legislation, Democrats are the ones using reconciliation this time. With the shoe on the other foot and with razor-thin Democratic majorities, the one-sided legislating has rendered Republicans — who make up exactly half of the Senate and almost half of the House — virtually irrelevant as Congress debates potentially momentous legislation expected to cost at least $1.5 trillion.

“It is really odd,” said Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who is among the few Republicans who occasionally join with Democrats on important legislation and who helped craft the bipartisan infrastructure bill awaiting a final vote in the House. “As somebody who is open to ideas from both sides and works on a lot of different initiatives with Democrats, to really not be involved or engaged in any aspect of it is just really odd.”

But there seems to be no fear of missing out among Republicans, given their hostility to the emerging domestic policy package, which — even in its scaled-back form as Democrats whittle it down to appease crucial centrists — would lead to a level of social spending that is anathema to G.O.P. lawmakers.

“They just have to satisfy their political base to the point where it gets pulled so far left,” Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, said of the Democrats. “Obviously we don’t like being shut out of the policymaking, but that is the choice they made.”