Biden pushes plans as key to avoid ‘America’s decline’
HOWELL, MICH. » Calling opponents of his plans “complicit in America’s decline,” President Joe Biden made the case Tuesday that his ambitious social spending proposal is key to America’s global competitiveness — even as he acknowledged the current $3.5 trillion price tag will shrink.
With his plans in jeopardy on Capitol Hill, Biden journeyed to Michigan, declaring he wanted to “set some things straight” about his agenda and cut through what he dismissed as “noise” in Washington.
“America’s still the largest economy in the world, we still have the most productive workers and the most innovative minds in the world, but we’re at risk of losing our edge as a nation,” he said at a union training center, surrounded by bulldozers and other heavy equipment.
The president went on to spell out his plans in greater detail than he has in some time, after spending the past week deep in the details of negotiations on Capitol Hill. He highlighted popular individual parts of the plan, including funding for early childhood education and investments to combat climate change, rather than the expensive topline. And he emphasized that the trillions in spending would be drawn out over a decade and paid for by tax increases on corporations and the wealthiest Americans.
Speaking briefly to reporters afterward, Biden acknowledged that the overall $3.5 trillion number for his social spending bill will decline, but he insisted that he and Democrats in Congress will “get it done.”
And in a signal of how much still may change by the time the bill makes it to his desk, Biden later suggested he’d sign a bill that included the controversial Hyde Amendment, which blocks federal funds from being used for abortions in
most cases. Moderate Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin wants it in the final bill, while progressive Democrats oppose it — but Biden told reporters, “I’d sign it either way.”
On Capitol Hill, strong signs were emerging that Democrats were coalescing around Biden’s push for a slimmed-down package in the $2 trillion range, a figure that seemed potentially acceptable to Manchin, D-W.Va., and other centrists with reservations. With all Republicans opposed, Biden can’t spare a single Democratic senator.
Polling suggests that elements in the social spending bill and a related $1 trillion infrastructure bill — such as expanded child care opportunities and roads-and-bridges infrastructure projects — are popular with large parts of the public. But even some of the White House’s closest allies have worried that the West Wing has not done enough to sell the spending. That brought Biden back on the road Tuesday, hitting the redleaning district of Democratic Rep. Elissa Slotkin to sell his policies.
“These bills are not about left versus right or moderate vs progressive,” Biden
said. “These bills are about competitiveness versus complacency.”
Back in Washington, negotiations continued on the pair of bills to boost spending on safety net, health and environmental programs and infrastructure projects. The $3.5 trillion price tag on the social services portion of Biden’s agenda has long been the sticking point, with progressives demanding the funding for their priorities and moderates balking at the eye-popping number.
But there’s a growing consensus — which Biden has expressed privately to lawmakers, and acknowledged publicly Tuesday — that the topline number will eventually shrink.
In multiple private meetings, Biden has now floated $2 trillion as a figure for his signature package, including in a call late Monday with progressive House lawmakers, who still advocated for a higher amount, according to a person granted anonymity to discuss the private meeting.