Biden peddles infrastructure law to voters
Visits to a small-town bridge and an electric vehicle plant kick off tour aimed at averting a replay of 2010 losses.
When President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law in 2010, thenVice President Joe Biden was at his side. Months later, Biden watched with Obama as Democrats suffered staggering losses at the federal and state level in the midterm election.
Now Biden is the one who needs to sell historic legislation to the American people ahead of what’s expected to be another bleak midterm season for Democrats. This time it’s the $1.2-trillion infrastructure law, the largest such federal investment in decades — and the largest ever in some sectors.
And Biden hopes to soon promote the passage of his massive social spending framework, now stalled in Congress, which would fund clean energy, child care, tax credits, affordable housing, expanded healthcare and other initiatives.
The challenge, both then and now, is how to sell voters on plans whose benefits they might not see for several years.
Two days after signing the infrastructure bill into law, Biden took his goodwill tour to General Motors’ electric vehicle assembly plant in Detroit, where he took an electric SUV for a test drive and said: “That Hummer’s one hell of a vehicle.”
Biden said the infrastructure law will invest $7.5 billion on more electric vehicle charging stations, and that the $1.85-trillion “Build Back Better” plan, which lawmakers are still hashing out, would help boost U.S. manufacturing of electric vehicles and offer tax credits to those who buy them.
“We’re gonna make sure that the jobs of the future end up here in Michigan, not halfway around the world,” said the president, who was joined Wednesday by members of Michigan’s congressional delegation, GM Chief Executive Mary Barra, United Auto Workers President Ray Curry and Labor Secretary Marty Walsh.
While Biden’s speech on Wednesday highlighted the impact the two major initiatives would have on the auto industry, the environment and creating union jobs, on Tuesday he focused on basic infrastructure critical to rural America: roads, highspeed internet and water systems.
Visiting an 82-year-old bridge over the Pemigewasset River in Woodstock, N.H., Biden said the infrastructure bill addresses the basic needs of people in small towns across America.
“This is real stuff,” he told about 30 residents as snow fell across his face. “What does it mean if a school bus or water treatment trucks or logging trucks can’t cross? It means jobs. It means time. It means energy.” Without access to the bridge, the local Fire Department would need to drive 10 miles out of the way to reach the community, he said.
The bipartisan infrastructure legislation is a much-needed victory for Biden, who continues to face intraparty fighting over his landmark social safety net bill amid the pandemic and inflation largely driven by supply chain issues.
His infrastructure tour comes as the House prepares to vote on the “Build Back Better” plan. While the impact of that bill would be more immediate, it’s likely to pass entirely on Democratic votes, leaving Biden more open to Republican attacks of overspending.
He has seen his approval ratings drop even as the Democratic agenda remains popular. In a Washington Post-ABC poll released Nov. 14, 63% of respondents supported spending $1 trillion on infrastructure, but only 39% approved of Biden’s handling of the economy. His overall approval rating is 41%, down from 52% in April.
As the president’s motorcade wound through rural New Hampshire on Tuesday, he was greeted by proTrump and anti-Biden signs, some reading “Mandates are 4 greed and power,” a reference to rules imposed to fight COVID-19.
“One thing we learned from Obamacare is you can’t over-promise,” said Jim Manley, who was a senior aide for former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (DNev.) and played a significant role in the messaging and strategy around the Affordable Care Act. “But you need to figure out how exactly to show people that they’re going to benefit from what was just passed.”
Obamacare’s path is a reminder of both the importance of messaging and the long game politicians must play as they wait to see how the public receives their legislation. Republican criticisms of the Affordable Care Act — including fears of rising costs and losing beloved doctors and false rumors of “death panels” — dominated the 2010 and 2014 midterm elections.
By the 2018 midterm cycle, however, Democrats’ promise to protect Obamacare from future repeal attempts was a key component of their successful effort to retake the House. As president, Biden has been able to bolster the healthcare law by reducing premium costs through the American Rescue Act.
“The White House and many Democrats for sure will be frustrated at the lag time of how long it takes for people to feel benefits of things,” said Jeremy Rosner, a managing partner at GQR, a Democratic polling firm. “But the Obamacare case shows that, at some point, sound policy on things that touch people’s lives — like healthcare, roads or child care, things like that — ultimately ... help as messengers and become strong assets.”
That’s little comfort to Democrats heading into next year’s midterm election, a lesson Republicans learned in 2018.
“We were hoping tax reform would be the silver bullet to let us keep the House,” said Matt Gorman, a GOP strategist who was communications director of House Republicans’ campaign arm in the last midterm election cycle. “While I’m glad we did it — it was good policy — it was certainly not that silver bullet.”
In 2018, House Democrats gained control of 41 GOP-held seats. Vulnerable House Republicans had hoped their legislative wins would distract from controversies surrounding President Trump, but the tax overhaul wasn’t enough to overcome a year that saw a government shutdown, the Russia investigation, the separation of families at the U.S.-Mexico border and legal troubles for his aides.
Gorman said Republicans are likely to paint Biden as a “bystander,” not a leader, on events such as Afghanistan, the border and inflation. “You can’t turn a huge trend with a single piece of legislation,” he said.
Historically, the president’s party tends to lose seats in Congress during midterm elections. The 2022 map — now being redrawn based on the 2020 census — will probably favor House Republicans, according to multiple analyses. And House Democrats in some competitive districts, such as those of John Yarmuth of Kentucky and Ann Kirkpatrick of Arizona, have announced plans to retire.
Unlike Obamacare, the infrastructure bill, which won the support of 19 Republicans in the Senate and 13 in the House, is expected to remain popular. The messaging challenge includes distinguishing what work can be done now from what won’t be shovel-ready for several months or years. While some funds go to existing programs, many projects will only be in the planning stages a year from now.
Asked about the law’s $65-billion broadband service plan, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo told reporters this month that communities would see “activity and action” ahead of next year’s election, but that it would take “some number of months” for projects to get off the ground.
This week, members of the administration including Vice President Kamala Harris, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael S. Regan and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg are fanning out to red and blue states to promote the bill. The stops include a mix of politically significant regions and cities such as New Orleans, where Regan will highlight environmental justice funding.
On Tuesday, Biden drilled down on the specific issues the law was intended to address in places like Woodstock, which has a population of about 1,300.
“My message to the people of New Hampshire is simple .... New Hampshire and America are moving again,” he said. “Your life is going to change for the better. And that’s literal.”