A new sense of political urgency swept over Democrats on Wednesday as they raced to resolve the final issues stalling President Biden’s roughly $3 trillion economic agenda in the aftermath of a stinging election defeat in Virginia.
With a loss in the state’s gubernatorial race — along with a tight contest still unresolved in New Jersey — party leaders found themselves pining anew for lawmakers to set aside their differences and advance two spending initiatives that have been bogged down on Capitol Hill for months.
“I think it’s going to send a signal that we’ve got to produce. You know, the American public gave us a majority of both houses for a reason,” said Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.). “We’ve got to get results for people, and if we do, we’ve got a good chance to get a whole lot of votes. But if we, you know, argue amongst ourselves, and we don’t produce, that puts us at risk.”
What’s in Biden’s $1.75 trillion spending bill
The work continued primarily in the House, where Democrats continued to fine-tune a $1.75 trillion proposal to overhaul the nation’s health care, education, climate and tax laws. Party leaders hope to finalize the legislation on Wednesday, with the goal of voting on it before the end of the week. But a slew of issues remain unresolved, including an eleventh-hour effort to restore a plan to provide paid family and medical leave benefits that a key centrist, Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.), previously opposed.
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A successful vote in the House would still open the door for Democrats to advance a second, parallel measure to improve the country’s roads, bridges, pipes, ports and Internet connections. That $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill has been stuck in the House since it cleared the Senate on a bipartisan basis in August, a political casualty in the broader war between the party’s liberal and moderate members.
Democrats have sketched out similarly ambitious timetables in the past, only to be stymied by their own internal disputes. Biden has even intervened personally, hoping to salvage a sprawling policy agenda that corresponds with promises that he and other party candidates made during the 2020 presidential race.
What’s in Biden’s infrastructure and jobs plan
But there may have been no greater catalyst for swift action than the voting that concluded in Virginia, New Jersey and other states on Tuesday. Some Democrats saw those election results as a warning sign a year before Americans are set to return to the polls in 2022, when their narrow yet potent majorities in the House and Senate are on the line.
“That hurt Terry [McAuliffe] in a close race,” Kaine added, speaking of his party’s loss in the gubernatorial race. “And guess what, now we’re going to get the bills done. … But a lot of politics is about timing. And there was a time to do this that would help in both of these states … and [Democrats] blew the timing.”
The new political uncertainty underscored the high stakes for Democrats in the year after they swept into power in Washington on a plan to “build back better” — the president’s oft-repeated slogan that later became the name of one of his signature initiatives. Biden and his allies on Capitol Hill have framed their long-sought spending in historic terms, promising it would transform wide swaths of the economy amid the coronavirus pandemic.
But the Republican victory in Virginia — with GOP candidate Glenn Youngkin beating back Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe in a state Biden handily won in 2020 — still opened the door for fresh political attacks on Wednesday. Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, the leader of the GOP’s campaign arm for the Senate, said the result evinces that the “public is rejecting this big government socialism.”
“Inflation is the biggest issue for people right now, and it’s caused by big government,” he said.
Talks around the future of that $1.75 trillion package continued “past midnight” Wednesday morning, according to Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), who updated lawmakers during a morning speech on the chamber floor. Democrats have a number of critical issues still to resolve with the package, including lingering concerns aired by Manchin as to whether the party is moving too quickly to adopt a measure that could add to the deficit and worsen inflation.
Inside the last-ditch effort by Democratic women to pressure Manchin and salvage paid family and medical leave
Publicly, though, Schumer instead touted “great progress,” pointing as an example to the agreement brokered Tuesday among fractious Democrats over a plan that aims to lower prescription drug costs for millions of seniors. The new policy opens the door for party lawmakers to deliver on one of their signature campaign promises, though the pricing proposal is still significantly scaled back from its original form.
“We are close, we are determined, [and] we are confident we will succeed in rewarding the trust the American people have placed in us,” Schumer told lawmakers.
Other unresolved issues include late tweaks to policy proposals designed to fight climate change and an eleventh-hour effort to tackle immigration as part of the $1.75 trillion package, according to Democratic aides. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Wednesday also said lawmakers had revived an effort to provide paid family and medical leave as part of the bill.
The still-forming plan would provide four weeks of benefits starting in 2024, according to a Democratic aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a policy that has not been finalized. It appears to include family, medical and sick leave at a cost of about $200 billion, the aide added.
The idea previously had been jettisoned from the $1.75 trillion blueprint that Biden presented to Democrats last week, a reflection of months of unsuccessful talks with Manchin, who questioned the solvency and necessity of such a social benefit program. In bringing it back, though, Pelosi appeared to be daring the moderate senator to strip out a proposal Democrats believe is one of the most popular in the total package.
“While it was a reduction in dollars from the original $3.5 trillion package, it was not a reduction in values,” Pelosi said of Democrats’ efforts to scale down their original spending plans to resolve issues raised by Manchin.
Without a resolution on that spending plan, Democrats remain unable to deliver a final successful vote on a second, roughly $1.2 trillion measure to improve the nation’s infrastructure. Liberals in the House have held up that package as leverage while negotiations continue with Manchin and other moderates over the rest of Biden’s economic agenda.
Manchin this week urged liberals to loosen their blockade, given the bipartisan support for the public works spending deal, which he helped negotiate. Other centrists, including Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.), in recent days had stressed that swifter House passage might have provided a boost for Democrats in his home state — potentially giving McAuliffe the edge he would have needed to prevail.
With a loss in the state’s gubernatorial race — along with a tight contest still unresolved in New Jersey — party leaders found themselves pining anew for lawmakers to set aside their differences and advance two spending initiatives that have been bogged down on Capitol Hill for months.
“I think it’s going to send a signal that we’ve got to produce. You know, the American public gave us a majority of both houses for a reason,” said Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.). “We’ve got to get results for people, and if we do, we’ve got a good chance to get a whole lot of votes. But if we, you know, argue amongst ourselves, and we don’t produce, that puts us at risk.”
What’s in Biden’s $1.75 trillion spending bill
The work continued primarily in the House, where Democrats continued to fine-tune a $1.75 trillion proposal to overhaul the nation’s health care, education, climate and tax laws. Party leaders hope to finalize the legislation on Wednesday, with the goal of voting on it before the end of the week. But a slew of issues remain unresolved, including an eleventh-hour effort to restore a plan to provide paid family and medical leave benefits that a key centrist, Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.), previously opposed.
ADVERTISING
A successful vote in the House would still open the door for Democrats to advance a second, parallel measure to improve the country’s roads, bridges, pipes, ports and Internet connections. That $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill has been stuck in the House since it cleared the Senate on a bipartisan basis in August, a political casualty in the broader war between the party’s liberal and moderate members.
Democrats have sketched out similarly ambitious timetables in the past, only to be stymied by their own internal disputes. Biden has even intervened personally, hoping to salvage a sprawling policy agenda that corresponds with promises that he and other party candidates made during the 2020 presidential race.
What’s in Biden’s infrastructure and jobs plan
But there may have been no greater catalyst for swift action than the voting that concluded in Virginia, New Jersey and other states on Tuesday. Some Democrats saw those election results as a warning sign a year before Americans are set to return to the polls in 2022, when their narrow yet potent majorities in the House and Senate are on the line.
“That hurt Terry [McAuliffe] in a close race,” Kaine added, speaking of his party’s loss in the gubernatorial race. “And guess what, now we’re going to get the bills done. … But a lot of politics is about timing. And there was a time to do this that would help in both of these states … and [Democrats] blew the timing.”
The new political uncertainty underscored the high stakes for Democrats in the year after they swept into power in Washington on a plan to “build back better” — the president’s oft-repeated slogan that later became the name of one of his signature initiatives. Biden and his allies on Capitol Hill have framed their long-sought spending in historic terms, promising it would transform wide swaths of the economy amid the coronavirus pandemic.
But the Republican victory in Virginia — with GOP candidate Glenn Youngkin beating back Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe in a state Biden handily won in 2020 — still opened the door for fresh political attacks on Wednesday. Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, the leader of the GOP’s campaign arm for the Senate, said the result evinces that the “public is rejecting this big government socialism.”
“Inflation is the biggest issue for people right now, and it’s caused by big government,” he said.
Talks around the future of that $1.75 trillion package continued “past midnight” Wednesday morning, according to Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), who updated lawmakers during a morning speech on the chamber floor. Democrats have a number of critical issues still to resolve with the package, including lingering concerns aired by Manchin as to whether the party is moving too quickly to adopt a measure that could add to the deficit and worsen inflation.
Inside the last-ditch effort by Democratic women to pressure Manchin and salvage paid family and medical leave
Publicly, though, Schumer instead touted “great progress,” pointing as an example to the agreement brokered Tuesday among fractious Democrats over a plan that aims to lower prescription drug costs for millions of seniors. The new policy opens the door for party lawmakers to deliver on one of their signature campaign promises, though the pricing proposal is still significantly scaled back from its original form.
“We are close, we are determined, [and] we are confident we will succeed in rewarding the trust the American people have placed in us,” Schumer told lawmakers.
Other unresolved issues include late tweaks to policy proposals designed to fight climate change and an eleventh-hour effort to tackle immigration as part of the $1.75 trillion package, according to Democratic aides. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Wednesday also said lawmakers had revived an effort to provide paid family and medical leave as part of the bill.
The still-forming plan would provide four weeks of benefits starting in 2024, according to a Democratic aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a policy that has not been finalized. It appears to include family, medical and sick leave at a cost of about $200 billion, the aide added.
The idea previously had been jettisoned from the $1.75 trillion blueprint that Biden presented to Democrats last week, a reflection of months of unsuccessful talks with Manchin, who questioned the solvency and necessity of such a social benefit program. In bringing it back, though, Pelosi appeared to be daring the moderate senator to strip out a proposal Democrats believe is one of the most popular in the total package.
“While it was a reduction in dollars from the original $3.5 trillion package, it was not a reduction in values,” Pelosi said of Democrats’ efforts to scale down their original spending plans to resolve issues raised by Manchin.
Without a resolution on that spending plan, Democrats remain unable to deliver a final successful vote on a second, roughly $1.2 trillion measure to improve the nation’s infrastructure. Liberals in the House have held up that package as leverage while negotiations continue with Manchin and other moderates over the rest of Biden’s economic agenda.
Manchin this week urged liberals to loosen their blockade, given the bipartisan support for the public works spending deal, which he helped negotiate. Other centrists, including Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.), in recent days had stressed that swifter House passage might have provided a boost for Democrats in his home state — potentially giving McAuliffe the edge he would have needed to prevail.
