Biden seeks to salvage Build Back Better
What happened
President Biden and Democrats restarted negotiations with Sen. Joe Manchin on a modified Build Back Better bill this week, after the West Virginia centrist Democrat angered progressives and the White House by declaring he wouldn’t support the legislation in its current form. Manchin’s announcement—“this is a no”—was made during a Fox News appearance, and followed weeks of negotiations with the White House aimed at securing Manchin’s buy-in on the $1.9 trillion bill, which would expand the nation’s social safety net and direct billions toward fighting climate change. It blindsided Biden and other Democrats who’d hoped to pass the bill, which cleared the House in November, early next year. “I cannot vote to continue with this piece of legislation, I just can’t,” said Manchin. He cited concerns about deficit spending during a time of rising inflation, the pandemic, and “geopolitical unrest,” and was reportedly angry that Democrats had publicly singled him out as an impediment. His announcement drew a sharp rebuke from White House press secretary Jen Psaki, who called it “a sudden and inexplicable reversal.”
Manchin has repeatedly criticized the funding mechanisms in the bill, a 10-year plan that funds numerous programs for shorter periods to keep the price tag down. He says the bill should fully fund its provisions by removing some of them—and has in particular taken aim at a one-year extension of an enhanced child tax credit that gives most parents up to $300 a month per child. Several colleagues said he had privately raised concerns that parents would spend the money on drugs. The Washington Post reported that during negotiations, Manchin had proposed a $1.8 trillion bill that would expand Obamacare, fund universal pre-K for 10 years, and include hundreds of billions in climate spending, but lose the child tax credit, a measure progressives strongly support.
Biden and some Democrats expressed optimism that a reworked bill can still pass. Manchin and Biden had a cordial conversation that ended with an understanding that negotiations would continue. “Sen. Manchin and I are going to get something done,” Biden said.
What the editorials said
Manchin has done “a service to the country,” said The Wall Street Journal. By blocking the Democrats’ “radical agenda,” he’s rescued us from “huge tax increases and new entitlements that would fan inflation and erode the incentive for Americans to work.” Democrats howling over his principled stand should instead thank him for making them “face political reality before they leap off a cliff.”
Manchin’s “resistance could prove productive,” said The Washington Post. His fear that the bill would goose inflation is groundless, but he’s zeroed in on the bill’s “root problem”: a refusal to make hard choices and prioritize programs for long-term funding. If Democrats can unite around key measures—including climate spending, support for children, and making Obamacare health plans cheaper—they may end up with “a substantially better bill.”
What the columnists said
Manchin’s arguments for opposing the bill are “a combination of nonsensical and incoherent,” said Michael Cohen in MSNBC.com. He trumpets concern for “threats” like the national debt, while ignoring more pressing threats. The tax credit could reduce child poverty by 40 percent, and expanded Obamacare subsidies could help address the U.S.’s declining life expectancies. Climate change, meanwhile, puts “the planet’s long-term future” at risk. It doesn’t get any more threatening than that.
Manchin is right about one thing, said Jonathan Chait in NYMag .com. Democrats were acting on the belief that once a public benefit is in place, Congress will be loath to end it. But there’s a big difference between proactively killing a program and letting one expire. The latter is “very easy to do”—and will be the inevitable result if Republicans regain control of Congress. Democrats’ failure to grasp that reality “is an act of catastrophic stupidity.”
After passing the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan and a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package, Biden and the Democrats could be closing out 2021 on a note of “pride and accomplishment,” said Charles Cook in the National Journal. Instead, they “head into the holiday season deeply demoralized” and “badly damaged politically”—and it’s their own fault. They “badly miscalculated what was realistic” with a 50-50 Senate, forgetting a key political maxim: “If you want to do big things, you have to win elections big.”
A “once-in-a-generation opportunity to improve American society” is still within Democrats’ grasp, said Ben Ritz in The New York Times. Even a scaled-back bill could deliver “both lasting policy change and the political victory they so desperately need.” It’ll mean making hard choices, like abandoning or scaling back the child tax credit. But the surviving programs “will be more successful, more popular, and more durable.” Compromise isn’t easy, but failure is something “America cannot afford.”