Baltimore Sun

Biden looks to build economic case

President takes aim at GOP proposals on taxes, spending

- By Jim Tankersley

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden assailed House Republican­s in an address Thursday over their tax and spending plans, including potential changes to popular retirement programs, as he ramps up for what is likely to be a run for reelection.

The president’s speech, in Springfiel­d, Virginia, was his latest attempt to reframe the economic narrative away from the rapid price increases that dogged much of his first two years in office and toward his stewardshi­p of an economy that has churned out steady growth and strong job gains.

Speaking in a steamfitte­rs union hall for what aides billed as the president’s first major economic speech of the new year, Biden sought to take credit for the strength of the labor market, a falling inflation rate and news from the Commerce Department on Thursday morning that the economy grew at an annualized pace of 2.9% at the end of last year. And he cast House Republican­s and their economic policy proposals as roadblocks to continued improvemen­t.

“At the time I was sworn in, the pandemic was raging and the economy was reeling,” Biden said. He then ticked through the actions he took to aid in the recovery. Those included $1.9 trillion in pandemic and economic aid; a bipartisan bill to repair and upgrade roads, bridges, water pipes and other infrastruc­ture; and a sweeping industrial policy bill to spur domestic

investment in advanced manufactur­ing sectors like semiconduc­tors and speed research and developmen­t to seed new industries.

Biden denounced Republican proposals to replace federal income taxes with a national sales tax, curb safety-net spending and risk a government default by refusing to raise the federal borrowing limit without deep spending cuts. Why, he asked, “would Americans give up the progress we’ve made for the chaos they’re suggesting?”

“I will not let anyone use the full faith and credit of the United States as a bargaining chip,” Biden said, reiteratin­g his refusal to negotiate over raising the debt limit. “The

United States of America — we pay our debts.”

But the president also sought to reach out to working-class voters — in places like his native Scranton, Pennsylvan­ia — who have increasing­ly voted Republican in recent elections. Biden said those voters have been left behind by U.S. economic policy in recent years, and he tried to woo them back by promising that his policies would continue to bring high-paying manufactur­ing jobs that do not require a college degree to people who feel “invisible” in the economy.

“They remember, in my old neighborho­ods, why the jobs went away,” Biden said. He then vowed to “build an

economy where nobody’s left behind — and I mean it: nobody.”

The speech built on a pattern for Biden, who has found the new and narrow Republican majority to be both a political threat and an opportunit­y.

Republican­s in the chamber have demanded deep cuts in federal spending in exchange for raising the borrowing limit, a position that risks an economic catastroph­e given the huge sums of money that the United States borrows to pay for its financial obligation­s.

The president has refused to tie any spending cuts to raising the debt limit and has called on Congress to increase the $31.4 trillion

cap so that the nation can continue paying its bills and avoid a federal default.

But Biden, who is facing a divided Congress for the first time in his presidency, is increasing­ly acting as if the newly empowered conservati­ves have given him a political opening on economic policy. As he prepares for a likely reelection bid in 2024, he is seizing on the least popular proposals floated by House members to cast himself as a champion of the working class, retirees and economic progress.

House Republican­s have not released a detailed or unified economic agenda, and they have not made a clear set of demands for raising the debt limit, though they largely agree that Biden must accept significan­t spending curbs.

But members and factions of the Republican conference have pushed for votes on a variety of proposals that have little support among voters, including raising the retirement age for Social Security and Medicare and replacing the federal income tax with a national sales tax.

Biden has sought to brand the entire Republican Party with those proposals, even though it is not clear if the measures have majority support in the conference or will ever come to a vote.

But key factions in the GOP are demanding cuts to the growth of those programs in the name of reducing future accumulati­on of debt, and Biden has been happy to cast them as the true contrast to his economic agenda. He has denounced cuts to safety-net programs and threatened to veto such efforts.

“The president is building an economy from the bottom up and the middle out, and protecting Social Security and Medicare,” Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, said this week.

“Republican­s want to cut Social Security, want to cut Medicare — programs Americans have earned, have paid in — and impose a 30% national sales tax that will increase taxes on working families,” she said. “That is what they have said they want to do, and that is clearly their plan.”

The focus on Republican­s has allowed Biden to divert the economic conversati­on from inflation, which hit 40-year highs last year but receded in the past several months, though it remains above historical norms.

 ?? ANDREW HARNIK/AP ?? President Joe Biden greets audience members Thursday at a steamfitte­rs union hall in Springfiel­d, Virginia.
ANDREW HARNIK/AP President Joe Biden greets audience members Thursday at a steamfitte­rs union hall in Springfiel­d, Virginia.

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