To Democrats, Manchin has been both spoiler and scapegoat
Donald Trump’s profile may have receded, but Democrats have found another bogeyman to unite against. This time, it’s someone from their own party: Sen. Joe Manchin III, W.Va.
Democrats, the story goes, spent months planning a historic, once-in-a-generation investment in the safety net and climate. They whittled down their initial $6 trillion plan to only the most critical priorities, reducing the bill to a lean-and-mean $3.5 trillion. They researched every possible penny of tax hikes and other offsets that enable their agenda to be fiscally responsible without burdening the middle class.
They were ready to pass the New Deal of the 21st century. Preferably by this coming Monday, the deadline they’d set for passing another plank of President Joe Biden’s agenda.
Then along came Manchin, raining on their parade.
Manchin — who wields the critical 50th Democratic vote in an evenly split Senate — has said $3.5 trillion is too much, too soon. Other Democrats, such as Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.) have also voiced objections about the bill, but Manchin seems to have attracted the most ire, frustration and desperation from his fellow party members.
Including the president. After a White House meeting Wednesday, Manchin said Biden had pleaded with him: “Please, just work on it. Give me a number, and tell me what you can live with and what you can’t.”
In some ways, yes, Manchin is happily playing the role of spoiler. But in others, he has proved a convenient scapegoat for broader budgetary challenges roiling Democrats right now. That’s because even if he (and Sinema) did suddenly decide to become team players — that is, they sign off on the $3.5 trillion price tag — Democratic leaders would still have trouble passing their agenda under the parameters they’ve set for themselves.
Democratic leadership has publicly announced two major constraints for the party’s agenda, one on each side of the ledger. The first is how much they can devote to things that cost money — spending programs such as paid leave and pre-K, or tax breaks for children and clean energy. That’s what that $3.5 trillion refers to: the gross cost of all those proposals.
The other constraint is on the “offsets” side of the balance sheet. Biden and other Democrats have promised to pay for that entire $3.5 trillion agenda without raising a penny of taxes on anyone making under $400,000 — which covers more than 95% of Americans.
That limitation made the task of raising this enormous amount of money difficult enough. But in recent weeks, Democratic lawmakers have also gotten cold feet about raising taxes on even the eligible top 5%.
If you look closely at all the things that Democrats have promised to do, that $3.5 trillion top-line figure is probably much too low. So even if Manchin fell in line, Democrats would still struggle to stuff all their various goodies and giveaways into a $3.5 trillion package. They will almost certainly attempt to do so partly through budget gimmicks, such as saying some proposals expire after a few years even though everyone expects them to get renewed.
Budget gimmicks alone, though, won’t do the job.
Democrats must start having tough conversations within their party about which initiatives to prioritize, shrink or cut entirely. Manchin has offered some ideas for trimming spending that are, frankly, bad (such as adding work requirements to the child tax credit). But some experts, such as the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, have offered relatively common-sense suggestions for how to slim down the bill by better targeting safety-net expansions to the neediest (e.g., requiring wealthier seniors to pay premiums for new Medicare benefits).
Well, to clarify, I think such ideas are common-sense. They are likely to trigger a nasty fight with the party’s left wing, though, which is probably why they haven’t been adopted already. Fortunately for Democratic leaders, the party is still relatively united in blaming Manchin for obstructing their agenda. So long as that continues, these more difficult confrontations can get kicked further down the road.