The other big winners from Tuesday night aside from Republicans up and down the ticket? Democratic Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema, now newly empowered by a rejection of Democratic socialist policies from voters in Virginia and New Jersey. If Biden’s infrastructure and spending bills in Congress weren’t already stalled, they both could be pronounced dead on the House floor soon if Democrats can’t revive their efforts to pass something. They’re literally trying to pass something big before the midterms next year. The negotiations and wrangling have gone so badly that Democrats running both chambers and controlling the White House couldn’t get their agenda passed.
Democrats in the House may start turning on their own leadership soon if they can’t get something happening:
“The Youngkin win in Virginia sends a signal to Democrats: Americans want to get back to work and want their kids to succeed and don’t want policies that are aimed to pit people against each other,” a senior House GOP aide told Fox News. “If I were a moderate Democrat, I’d take tonight as a clear sign that a vote for trillions of dollars of socialist spending while inflation is already hurting Americans’ pocketbooks is a vote in the wrong direction.”
Even some Democratic strategists, like David Axelrod, former advisor to President Obama, expressed the terrible predicament the Biden White House now finds itself in:
“If you’re a Democrat sitting on Capitol Hill and you’re from one of these swing districts in suburban areas, are you rethinking tonight your vote on this reconciliation package?” Axelrod said Tuesday night on CNN. “Are you thinking, maybe it’s best, we shouldn’t do it.”
Axelrod added: “If I was sitting in the White House, if I were sitting in the leadership of the, in Democratic counsels in the Congress, I’d be worried about that. I’d be trying to firm these people up.”
Where do House Democrats go from here? How can Pelosi possibly hope to bridge progressives, pushing for trillions in spending, and Senate moderates like Sinema and Manchin? They were both already on record as being unsupportive of efforts to trim the packages, yet retain the pork. At this point, after the Virginia results, forget it:
His social spending package, once valued at $3.5 trillion, is now down to a leaner $1.75 trillion after progressives and moderates agreed to cut programs, including universal community college and paid family leave. That bill only requires a simple majority to pass in the Senate because it would be done through a process known as budget reconciliation, but moderate Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona have said they still will not support it.
However, some Democrats have taken the election results to mean they better act quickly to ram these bills through before they get into the election year and things slow to a crawl:
A shocking defeat in Virginia sent chills through Capitol Hill Democrats on Tuesday and Wednesday, sparking recriminations between factions and adding urgency to their work on President Joe Biden’s agenda.
“We have been circling the landing for a long time. Now, it’s time to stick the landing,” Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., a Biden friend and ally, said Wednesday on MSNBC. “We need to pass and send to his desk from the Congress a Build Back Better bill and an infrastructure bill.”
Some progressives on Twitter have also expressed support for Democrats acting now while they still can, ignoring the election results, and passing something big and bold. The thinking is that Democrats are on track to lose big in 2022 no matter what happens, why not use this opportunity to pass something huge and make their mark? Fortunately, for the country and fiscal sanity, enough Congressional Democrats probably won’t feel obliged to join that line of thinking and drive their caucus over the cliff.
Tuesday’s elections changed the course moving forward. Biden’s agenda will likely be stalled or severely curtailed to move something down the field and score some kind of points before next year. Moderate Democrats have been empowered, and the people have had their say.
