Joe Biden announced on Thursday that “we have a deal”, signaling a bipartisan agreement on a $953bn infrastructure plan that would achieve his top legislative priority and validate his efforts to reach across the political aisle.
Biden made a surprise appearance in front of the cameras with members of the group of senators, Republicans and Democrats, after an agreement was reached on Thursday. Details of the deal were scarce to start, but the pared-down plan, with $559bn in new spending, has rare bipartisan backing and could open the door to the president’s more sweeping $4tn proposals later on.
The president said not everyone got what they wanted and that other White House priorities would be done separately in a congressional budget process known as reconciliation.
“We’ve struck a deal,” Biden then tweeted. “A group of senators – five Democrats and five Republicans – has come together and forged an infrastructure agreement that will create millions of American jobs.”
The senators have struggled over how to pay for the new spending but left for the White House with a sense of confidence that funding issues had been addressed.
Biden’s top aides had met with senators for back-to-back meetings on Capitol Hill and later huddled with the House speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer.
The agreement comes with a complex legislative push. Pelosi on Thursday welcomed the bipartisan package, but she warned that it must be paired with the president’s bigger goals now being prepared by Congress under a separate so-called the budget reconciliation process.
“This is important,” Pelosi said. “There ain’t going to be a bipartisan bill without a reconciliation bill.” The Democratic leader vowed the House would not vote on it until the Senate had dealt with both packages.
The major hurdle for a bipartisan agreement has been financing. Biden demanded no new taxes on anyone making less than $400,000, while Republican lawmakers were unwilling to raise taxes beyond such steps as indexing the gasoline tax to inflation.
Biden has sought $1.7tn in his American Jobs Plan, part of nearly $4tn in broad infrastructure spending on roads, bridges and broadband internet but also including the so-called care economy of child care centers, hospitals and elder care.
With Republicans opposed to Biden’s proposed corporate tax rate increase, from 21% to 28%, the group has looked at other ways to raise revenue. Biden rejected their idea to allow gas taxes paid at the pump to rise with inflation, viewing it as a financial burden on American drivers.
The broad reconciliation bill would likely include tax increases on the wealthy and corporations, so a tension still exists over funding for some Republicans and business groups.
According to a White House readout of the Wednesday meeting with Schumer and Pelosi, the leaders talked with acting budget director Shalanda Young, National Economic Council director Brian Deese and Domestic Policy Council director Susan Rice, and they discussed the two-track approach – the smaller bipartisan deal now emerging and the more sweeping plan of Democratic priorities.
Schumer said the leaders “support the concepts” they have heard from the bipartisan negotiations.
The Democratic leaders also insisted on the two-part process ahead, starting with initial votes in July to consider the bipartisan deal and to launch the lengthy procedure for the Democrats’ proposal, now drafted at nearly $6tn t.
The Democrats’ bigger proposal would run through the budget reconciliation process, which would allow passage of Biden’s priorities by majority vote, without the need for support from Republicans to overcome the Senate’s 60-vote threshold. It would require multiple rounds of voting that are likely to extend into fall.
Like Pelosi, Schumer said, “One can’t be done without the other.”
Source: US Politics - theguardian.com
