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      Joe Biden dismisses bad polling and says domestic agenda set to pass

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      Joe BidenJoe Biden dismisses bad polling and says domestic agenda set to pass
      President speaks to reporters at end of G20 summit in Rome
      Progressives Sanders and Khanna optimistic on spending plan
      Virginia: governor race becomes referendum on Biden
      Victoria Bekiempis and Martin PengellySun 31 Oct 2021 16.35 EDTFirst published on Sun 31 Oct 2021 11.53 EDTJoe Biden sought to brush off concerns about bad polling on Sunday, telling reporters he expected Democrats to overcome internal differences and pass both his domestic spending plan and a bipartisan infrastructure deal in the week to come.Republican Adam Kinzinger: I’ll fight Trumpism ‘cancer’ outside CongressRead moreEarlier, an NBC News poll found that 54% of US adults disapproved of Biden’s performance, down six points since August, a period in which the president’s domestic agenda has stalled amid intra-party division.Biden spoke to reporters in Rome at the end of the G20, before traveling to Glasgow for the Cop26 climate summit.He said: “I didn’t run to determine how well I’m going to do in the polls. I ran to make sure that I follow through on what I said I would do as president of the United States.“I said that I would make sure that we were in a position where we dealt with climate change, where we moved in a direction that would significantly improve the prospects of American workers having good jobs and good pay. And further that I would make sure that we dealt with the crisis that was caused by Covid.“… I believe we will pass my Build Back Better plan. I believe we will pass the infrastructure bill. Combined, they have $900bn in dealing with climate resilience, the largest investment in the history of the world that’s ever occurred. And it’s going to pass in my view, but we’ll see. We’ll see.”Biden has staked his presidency on his spending plans but Democrats in Congress have been split between progressives and moderates led by two senators, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona. Biden delayed his departure to Rome to plead with Democrats to pass his spending agenda.“We are at an inflection point,” he reportedly told House members. “The rest of the world wonders whether we can function.”Whether Democrats can deliver could also have significant implications for the midterm elections next year. Historically, parties holding the presidency fail to keep the House.Top Democrats reportedly want a final version of Biden’s $1.75tn spending plan drafted by Sunday and passed by Tuesday. The price tag has come down dramatically, from $3.5tn, with concessions to Manchin and Sinema. The infrastructure deal is valued at $1tn.Discussions continued throughout the weekend. Bernie Sanders, the chair of the Senate budget committee, told CNN’s State of the Union: “I can tell you, we are working right now. I spent all of yesterday on the telephone … as soon as I leave the studio, I’m going to be going back home to get on the phone.”Sanders said he was optimistic and added: “This is not easy stuff, but what we are trying to do is put together the most consequential piece of legislation in the modern history of this country, which will transform the role of government in protecting the needs of working families.”Sanders said he was fighting for action on prescription drugs costs to be included in the spending bill, an issue on which he and Sinema are in very evident opposition.In a 50-50 Senate, and with no Republican support on spending, Manchin and Sinema are key. Democrats must use reconciliation, a way to pass budgetary initiatives via a simple majority rather than 60 votes. The vice-president, Kamala Harris, has the decisive vote.The Senate did pass the infrastructure bill in August via a bipartisan vote but House progressives stymied it in an attempt to win concessions on the spending plan. On Sunday Ro Khanna of California, a prominent House progressive, told CBS’s Face the Nation he expected success.“We are working to add things in,” he said. “The negotiations are taking place. I’m going to be a yes. I think we can have the vote by Tuesday … I’m yes on the framework.”Cabinet members also expressed optimism. The transportation secretary, Pete Buttigieg, told Fox News Sunday: “We are teed up for major action soon.”Asked if Congress would pass both pieces of legislation this week, he said: “We are the closest we have ever been.”Buttigieg also made a point sure to surface in the midterms if Biden is successful, telling ABC’s This Week he “wouldn’t let Republicans off the hook on voting for the family provisions too.“I know they probably won’t but it’s not too late for some of them to join Democrats who are united in believing that the time has come for us to actually put our money where our mouth is [and] support American families.”A Republican senator, Rick Scott of Florida, told Fox News Sunday Biden’s spending had “to end” as it was “causing inflation” and “hurting the poor families”.“We gotta live within our means like every family does,” Scott said.Huma Abedin says kiss from unnamed senator was not sexual assaultRead moreAsked if that meant Republicans should support repeal of tax cuts they passed under Donald Trump which are projected to add $2tn to the national debt, Scott said both taxes and spending should be cut.On NBC’s Meet the Press the energy secretary, Jennifer Granholm, suggested Biden’s polling would be boosted when Americans see his spending bill.“They’ll see that they’re going to get a continuation of that child tax credit,” Granholm said. “They’ll see people being put to work in clean energy all across this country.“They’re going to see the ability to have senior citizens and people with disabilities being cared for in their homes. They’ll see their costs of living come down as a result of having children. This bill and the real impacts that people will see will have an impact on those ratings.”In Rome, Biden told reporters: “You know, you all believed [the spending bill] wouldn’t happen from the very beginning, the moment I announced it, and you always seem amazed when it’s alive again. Maybe it won’t work. But I believe we’ll see by the end of next week at home that the bills have passed.”
      The Associated Press contributed to this report
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      Resilience: the one word progressives need in the face of Trump, Covid and more | Robert Reich

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      OpinionUS politicsResilience: the one word progressives need in the face of Trump, Covid and moreRobert ReichThe climate crisis, the economy, Biden’s struggle to enact his spending agenda. The list goes on. The lesson? Be strong Sun 31 Oct 2021 01.00 EDTLast modified on Sun 31 Oct 2021 01.09 EDTI often tell my students that if they strive to achieve full and meaningful lives, they should expect failures and disappointments. We learn to walk by falling down again and again. We learn to ride a bicycle by crashing into things. We learn to make good friends by being disappointed in friendship. Failure and disappointment are prerequisites to growth.‘A deliberate, orchestrated campaign’: the real story behind Trump’s attempted coupRead moreThe real test of character comes after failures and disappointments. It is resilience: how easily you take failures, what you learn from them, how you bounce back.This is a hard lesson for high-achievers used to jumping over every hoop put in front of them. It’s also a hard lesson for people who haven’t had all the support and love they might have needed when growing up. In fact, it’s a hard lesson for almost everyone in a culture such as ours, that worships success and is embarrassed by failure and is inherently impatient.Why am I telling you this now? Because we have gone through a few very difficult years: Donald Trump’s racist nationalism and his attacks on our democracy, a painful reckoning with systemic racism, angry political divisions, a deadly pandemic accompanied by a recession, and climate hazards such as floods and wildfires.We assumed everything would be fine again once these were behind us. But we now find ourselves in a disorienting limbo. There is no clearly demarcated “behind us”. The pandemic still lurks. The economy is still worrisome. Americans continue to be deeply angry with each other. The climate crisis still poses an existential threat. Trump and other insurrectionists have not yet been brought to justice. Democracy is still threatened.And Biden and the Democrats have been unable to achieve the scale of change many of us wanted and expected.If you’re not at least a bit disappointed, you’re not human. To some, it feels like America is failing.But bear with me. I’ve learned a few things in my half-century in and around politics, and my many years teaching young people. One is that things often look worse than they really are. The media (including social media) sells subscriptions and advertising with stories that generate anger and disappointment. The same goes for the views of pundits and commentators. Pessimists always appear wiser than optimists.Another thing I’ve learned is that expectations for a new president and administration are always much higher than they can possibly deliver. Our political system was designed to make it difficult to get much done, at least in the short run. So the elation that comes with the election of someone we admire almost inevitably gives way to disappointment.A third thing: in addition to normal political constraints, positive social change comes painfully slowly. It can take years, decades, sometimes a century or longer for a society to become more inclusive, more just, more democratic, more aware of its shortcomings and more determined to remedy them. And such positive changes are often punctuated by lurches backward. I believe in progress because I’ve seen so much of it in my lifetime, but I’m also aware of the regressive forces that constantly threaten it. The lesson here is tenacity – playing the long game.The US should cut the Pentagon budget to fund social | Emma Claire FoleyRead moreWhich brings me back to resilience. We have been through a difficult time. We wanted and expected it to be over: challenges overcome, perpetrators brought to justice, pandemic ended, nation healed, climate saved, politics transformed. But none of it is over. The larger goals we are fighting for continue to elude us.Yet we must continue the fight. If we allow ourselves to fall into fatalism, or wallow in disappointment, or become resigned to what is rather than what should be, we will lose the long game. The greatest enemy of positive social change is cynicism about what can be changed.
      Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley and the author of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Common Good. His new book, The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It, is out now. He is a Guardian US columnist. His newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com
      TopicsUS politicsOpinionUS domestic policyJoe BidenBiden administrationDemocratsDonald TrumpRepublicanscommentReuse this content More

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      Democratic leaders want House votes on Biden domestic agenda by Tuesday

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      Biden administrationDemocratic leaders want House votes on Biden domestic agenda by TuesdayAnonymous sources outline ambitious timetable for spending plan so far stymied by centrist senators Associated Press in WashingtonSat 30 Oct 2021 16.01 EDTDemocratic leaders are hoping for House votes as soon as Tuesday on the two pillars of Joe Biden’s domestic spending agenda, two Democrats said Saturday, as the party mounted its latest push to get the long-delayed legislation through Congress.Joe Manchin single-handedly denied US families paid leave. That’s just cruel | Jill FilipovicRead moreTop Democrats would like a final House-Senate compromise on Biden’s now $1.75tn, 10-year social and environment plan to be written by Sunday, the Democrats said.Talks among White House, House and Senate officials were being held over the weekend, said the Democrats, who described the plans on condition of anonymity.An accord could clear the way for House passage of that bill and a separate $1tn measure funding road, rail and other infrastructure projects, the Democrats said.It remains unclear whether the ambitious timetable can be met. To clear the Senate, any agreement will need the backing of centrist Democrats Joe Manchin, of West Virginia, and Kyrsten Sinema, of Arizona.The two senators have forced Biden to retreat from his plan for a $3.5tn social and environment bill and to remove some initiatives from the measure.Republican opposition to the social and environmental bill is unanimous. Democrats hold the House and Senate but in the latter are 10 votes short of the necessary super-majority to pass legislation.They must therefore use reconciliation, a process for budgetary measures which allows for a simple majority. As the Senate is split 50-50 and controlled via the casting vote of Vice-President Kamala Harris, Manchin and Sinema have a tremendous amount of power.The Senate approved the infrastructure bill in August on a bipartisan vote. House progressives have since sidetracked that bill, in an effort to pressure moderates to back the larger social and environment bill.TopicsBiden administrationJoe BidenUS domestic policyUS politicsDemocratsJoe ManchinUS CongressnewsReuse this content More

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      Senate’s 50-50 split lets Manchin and Sinema revel in outsize influence

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      DemocratsSenate’s 50-50 split lets Manchin and Sinema revel in outsize influence Joe Biden, whose Build Back Better bill has been slashed by the two holdouts, said with ‘50 Democrats, every one is a president’David Smith in Washington@smithinamericaFri 29 Oct 2021 14.46 EDTLast modified on Fri 29 Oct 2021 15.11 EDTJoe Biden recently summed up his problems getting things done.In an America where the US Senate is split 50-50, then effectively any single senator can hold a veto over the president’s entire agenda. “Look,” laughed Biden at a CNN town hall, “you have 50 Democrats, every one is a president. Every single one. So, you got to work things out.”Joe Manchin single-handedly denied US families paid leave. That’s just cruel | Jill FilipovicRead moreIt explains why the most powerful man in the world is currently struggling to get his way in Washington – and why two members of his own party, Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema, are standing in his way.Such is the distribution of power that American presidents can only impose their will up to a point if Congress refuses to yield. While the White House can do much with executive orders and actions, major legislation must gain a majority of votes in the House of Representatives and Senate.Democrats do currently control both chambers – but only just. The Senate is evenly divided between 50 Democrats and 50 Republicans, meaning that Vice-President Kamala Harris must cast the tie-breaking vote. That means all 50 Democratic senators must be on board in the face of united Republican opposition – an increasingly safe (and bleak) assumption in polarised era.By contrast, President Franklin Roosevelt’s Democrats reached 59 seats in the then 96-member Senate, while President Lyndon Johnson’s Democrats had 68 in what by then was a 100-seat chamber. Biden is trying to match the scale of both men’s ambition with no room for error.This is why his agenda – huge investments in infrastructure and expanding the social safety net – depends on the blessing of Manchin and Sinema in what might seem to the watching world as a case of the tail wagging the dog.Bernie Sanders, an independent senator from Vermont defeated by Biden in last year’s Democratic primary, tweeted earlier this month: “2 senators cannot be allowed to defeat what 48 senators and 210 House members want.”But the cold reality is that, after months of painful wrangling and concessions, Manchin and Sinema have almost single-handedly narrowed the scale and scope of Biden’s grand vision.This week it emerged that Build Back Better plan would be halved from $3.5tn to $1.75tn, axing plans for paid family leave, lower prescription drug pricing and free community college. Sanders’s dream of including dental and vision care also failed to make the cut.Biden insists that the framework still represents the biggest ever investment in climate change and the greatest improvement to the nation’s healthcare system in more than a decade.He said at the White House on Friday: “No one got everything they wanted, including me, but that’s what compromise is. That’s consensus. And that’s what I ran on. I’ve long said compromise and consensus are the only way to get big things done in a democracy, important things for the country.”But what makes it especially galling for many is that opinion polls show the eliminated measures are highly popular. Manchin and Sinema have ensured that the US is destined to remain one of seven countries – along with the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea and Tonga – without paid leave for new mothers, according to UCLA’s World Policy Analysis Center.Biden met late on Tuesday evening with both senators at the White House. Countless newspaper columns and hours of airtime have been expended trying to understand the motives of the two holdouts, who can effectively decide whether Democrats keep their campaign promises – with huge implications for next year’s midterm elections.Manchin is not so mysterious. He hails from coal-rich West Virginia, a conservative state that Donald Trump won twice in a landslide, and once ran a campaign ad in which he shot a rifle at a legislative bill. He owns about $1m in shares in his son’s coal brokerage company and has raised campaign funds from oil and gas interests.Critics accuse him of putting personal and local concerns ahead of his party, the nation and the world. The USA Today newspaper wrote in an editorial: “It’s no stretch to conclude that Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin is risking the planet’s future to protect a dwindling pool of 14,000 coal mining jobs in his home state of West Virginia.”Sinema, however, has been described as enigmatic, sphinx-like and whimsical. In 2018 she became Arizona’s first Democratic senator for more than two decades and, despite progressive credentials and a flair for fashion statements, has taken conservative positions on several issues.She also provokes the left with stunts such as a thumbs-down gesture on the Senate floor when she voted against raising the federal minimum wage and, on Thursday, a parody of the TV comedy Ted Lasso with the Republican senator Mitt Romney. Perhaps tellingly, Sinema raised $1.1m in campaign funds in the last quarter with significant donations from the pharmaceutical and financial industries.In a divided Senate, where Republicans are consumed by Trump’s election lies, this duo holds the fate of Biden’s presidency in their hands. The haggling could go on for weeks more, granting Manchin and Sinema continued outsized influence and guaranteeing that their every move and word will be avidly scrutinised.Joe Lockhart, a former White House press secretary, tweeted: “My dream? Democrats pick up a few more Senate seats in 2022 and when Joe Manchin holds a press conference to declare what he can live with and what he can’t, nobody shows up.”TopicsDemocratsUS politicsUS SenateJoe BidenUS domestic policyUS CongressfeaturesReuse this content More

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      $555bn in climate action but no new tax on billionaires: what’s in Biden’s plan?

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      Joe Biden$555bn in climate action but no new tax on billionaires: what’s in Biden’s plan?President’s $1.75tn spending framework includes investments in childcare and healthcare, but 12 weeks of paid family leave is out Lauren ArataniThu 28 Oct 2021 12.15 EDTLast modified on Thu 28 Oct 2021 12.39 EDTJoe Biden on Thursday released the framework of a $1.75tn social and climate spending proposal after weeks of fraught negotiations with congressional Democrats.Biden makes $1.75tn pitch: ‘My presidency will be determined by what happens next’ – liveRead moreThe framework includes investments in childcare, climate change mitigation and an expansion of healthcare, but it is a significantly pared-down version of the original $3.5tn agenda Biden had proposed.In a statement, the White House said the president is confident this framework of the bill would be able to pass the House and Senate, although it appears negotiations on the proposal’s specific details will continue.Here is what we know so far:What’s in the bill?The bill includes substantial investment in young children, specifically funding for childcare and early childhood education. Under the proposal, most American families will save more than half of their spending on childcare, with bolstered benefits to working and low-income parents. It also includes universal pre-school for children aged three and four.A hallmark of the proposal’s climate mitigation plan is $555bn to reduce climate pollution and invest in clean energy. The proposal includes consumer rebates for Americans who invest in renewable energy, for example installing rooftop solar panels or buying an electric vehicle.The bill also includes incentives to expand renewable energy in the domestic supply chain, an accelerator program that will fund sustainability projects and funding for restoration and conservation efforts.The framework includes some provisions to bolster healthcare, including reducing healthcare premiums and tax credits to people who have been locked out of Medicaid because their state refused to expand Medicaid access. It will also include investments in affordable housing and an extension of the child tax credit.What was taken out?A few provisions that some Democrats were heavily advocating for were left out of the framework.Most notably, the proposal does not include 12 weeks of paid family leave. Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia was the primary holdout for the provision. Manchin has indicated that he believes a reconciliation bill – which would require only the support of Democrats in the Senate – is “not the place” for “a major policy”.Significant expansions to healthcare were cut out of the framework, including provisions to have Medicaid cover dental and vision costs, a plan to expand Medicaid to Americans in states that have refused to expand it themselves under the Affordable Care Act, and a proposal to empower Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices.Biden’s plan for free tuition at community colleges was also left out.The framework notably does not include the “billionaire tax” that was floated by some Democrats on Wednesday before it was swiftly killed by centrist holdouts.The billionaire tax would have seen a complete shift in the way Americans worth more than $1bn would pay taxes, targeting the billions of dollars in shares they own in their companies. Hours after the proposal was unveiled, Manchin said he would not support such a provision.How are Democrats planning to pay for it?Biden estimates the framework will cost about $1.75tn, and the White House says the bill will be funded “by asking more from the very largest corporations and the wealthiest Americans”.A central provision in the bill’s payment plan is shifting the corporate tax rate to 15% for corporations with more than $1bn in profits. While the current corporate tax rate is 21%, Democrats have agreed that loopholes allowed corporations to report lower profits to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) while boasting lofty profits to shareholders. The next tax rate will apply to the profit that is reported to shareholders.The bill also includes a surtax on the 0.02% wealthiest Americans and investments in IRS auditing enforcements.What’s next?The framework released by Biden on Thursday represents a broad outline of what will end up in the final bill. Congressional Democrats will need to get to work at drafting the actual legislation if everyone, particularly the party’s most progressive and conservative members, can agree on the basic framework. When that will happen will depend on how quickly everyone says they are on board.TopicsJoe BidenUS domestic policyUS CongressUS politicsJoe ManchinnewsReuse this content More

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      Biden plan pledges ‘largest effort to combat climate change in US history’

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      Joe BidenBiden plan pledges ‘largest effort to combat climate change in US history’Hundreds of billions to be given to clean energy, electric vehicles and flood defenses, officials say – but some key parts left out Oliver Milman in New York@olliemilmanThu 28 Oct 2021 11.41 EDTLast modified on Thu 28 Oct 2021 15.05 EDTThe Biden administration has said a vast spending bill is set to result in the “largest effort to combat climate change in American history”, with hundreds of billions of dollars set to be funneled into supporting clean energy, electric vehicles and new defenses against extreme weather events. But some key parts of Joe Biden’s original plan were left out.Biden makes $1.75tn pitch: ‘My presidency will be determined by what happens next’ – liveRead moreFollowing negotiations with Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema, two centrist Democratic senators who have opposed large portions of the original Build Back Better bill, the White House said it was confident a reduced version of the legislation will be able to pass both houses of Congress and will “set the United States on course to meet its climate goals”.This proposed framework includes $555bn in incentives, investments and tax credits aimed at bolstering the deployment of renewable energy such as solar and wind, as well as a tax break that will deliver up to $12,500 to people who buy an electric car. The bill will help deploy new electric buses and trucks, build community resilience to disastrous wildfires and floods and employ 300,000 people in a new “civilian climate corps”.In all, the White House said the legislation will cut planet-heating emissions by 1bn tons by 2030 and bring the US significantly closer to its goal of slashing carbon pollution in half this decade.At a press conference held on Thursday, Biden said the bill will represent “the most significant investment to address the climate crisis ever” and “will truly transform this nation”.“We are going to get off the sidelines of manufacturing solar panels and wind farms,” the president said, adding that the package will help double the number of electric cars on US roads within three years and provide 500,000 new charging stations for the vehicles. “We are once again going to be the innovators. It’s a big deal.”“The weather is not going to get better, it’s going to get a heck of a lot worse,” Biden continued. “It’s a blinking code red for America and the world.”The legislation has been significantly reduced following objections raised by Manchin and Sinema over its scope – Biden needs every Senate Democrat to vote for the bill to overcome unified Republican opposition to it – but the remaining framework still represents the first, and largest, major attempt by the US to tackle the unfolding climate crisis.“It’s a historic day for people and the planet,” said Gene Karpinski, president of the League of Conservation Voters. “Congress must swiftly pass the Build Back Better Act and send it to President Biden to sign into law.”On Thursday, Biden will travel to Europe for crucial UN climate talks to be held in Scotland. The US president has said it would be “very, very positive” for the reconciliation bill to pass before the Cop26 summit, in order to bolster American credibility and help convince other countries to do more to address the catastrophic wildfires, floods and heatwaves increasingly being unleashed by global heating.This effort has been repeatedly stymied by the objections of Manchin, a West Virginia senator with deep ties to the coal industry who managed to strike out of the bill a system that would have phased out fossil fuels from America’s electricity grid. This plan was responsible for a third of the emissions cuts in the original version of the legislation, according to analysts.The new framework does not include fees paid by oil and gas producers when they emit methane, a potent greenhouse gas. Manchin was also opposed to this fee in the original bill and rejected a proposal to include a tax or price on carbon emissions. The Environmental Protection Agency is, however, poised to regulate methane emissions through its existing powers.These omissions mean that the legislation’s framework represents a historic investment in clean energy but doesn’t include any mechanisms to reduce fossil fuel usage or even cut subsidies flowing to the oil, coal and gas companies that have caused the climate crisis.“Given the prime opportunity to cancel billions of dollars in domestic subsidies for oil and gas polluters, the president and congressional leadership have rolled over,” said Mitch Jones, policy director of Food and Water Watch. “A climate plan that fails to directly confront the oil and gas industry cannot possibly be considered meaningful.”Climate experts have, however, pointed out the bill, if passed, would represent a major step forward in acting on the climate crisis, while making clear that further emissions cuts will be needed to avoid the US, and the world, spiraling into a barely livable climatic state.Leah Stokes, a climate policy expert at the University of California, Santa Barbara, said it would be “great news” if the legislation passes because “the climate math is brutal”.“Even if we are lucky enough to get this bill over the finish line, we need more next year,” she tweeted. “The climate clock is ticking.”TopicsJoe BidenClimate crisisUS domestic policyUS CongressJoe ManchinUS politicsnewsReuse this content More