Category Archives: Democrat

Over the past several years, the Democratic Party has moved further left on US policy toward Israel, showing a greater willingness to criticize Israel and speak up in defense of the rights of Palestinians.

But President Joe Biden doesnt seem to have gotten the memo. And that gap between him and the more progressive members of his party is becoming a visible rift as the Biden administration struggles to address the escalating conflict between Israelis and Palestinians.

The recent fighting between Israel and Hamas, the Islamist militant group that has controlled Gaza since 2007, has so far left at least seven people in Israel dead from Hamas rockets and around 70 Palestinians, including 16 children, dead, more than 300 injured, and entire apartment buildings flattened in Gaza from Israeli airstrikes.

The Biden administration has firmly and publicly denounced Hamas for firing rockets indiscriminately at civilians in Israel. Yet it has refused to say a single harsh word to Israel publicly for its precision bombing of civilian targets in Gaza, instead repeating the constant refrain that Israel has the right to defend itself.

A summary of National Security Adviser Jake Sullivans Tuesday call with his Israeli counterpart said that He conveyed the Presidents unwavering support for Israels security and for its legitimate right to defend itself and its people, while protecting civilians.

That kind of unwavering defense of Israel wouldnt have ruffled many feathers in the Democratic Party 20 or maybe even 10 years ago. But times have changed. The party has changed. And now its doing more than just ruffling feathers.

By only stepping in to name Hamas actions which are condemnable & refusing to acknowledge the rights of Palestinians, Biden reinforces the false idea that Palestinians instigated this cycle of violence, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) tweeted on Wednesday. This is not neutral language. It takes a side the side of occupation.

This is becoming a problem for Biden, who promised to put human rights at the center of his foreign policy. Instead, hes finding himself calcified in the US-Israel policy of yesteryear, while his left flank on Israeli-Palestinian issues becomes ever more vocal.

It is splitting the party, a Democratic Senate staffer told me. Its splitting between those who think support for human rights includes Palestinians and those who dont.

Biden is standing still as his party is moving on this issue.

In March, a Gallup poll showed that 53 percent of Democrats favored placing more pressure on Israel to make compromises to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict a 10-point jump from 2018, and 20 points higher than in 2008.

That finding tracked with poll after poll showing liberal Democrats are less sympathetic to Israel than they were in years past, although most Americans still say they support Israel and Americas alliance with it.

Why the change? Much of it has to do with former President Donald Trumps favoritism toward Israel.

As president, Trump gave Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu nearly everything he wanted, including recognition of Israeli sovereignty over disputed territory like the Golan Heights, moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem, and a peace plan that fulfilled nearly all of the premiers wish list. Meanwhile, Trump closed a Palestinian political office in Washington, DC, stopped aid to the West Bank and Gaza, and effectively cut ties with top Palestinian officials.

As a result, Israel went from receiving broad bipartisan support to seeing concerns over its actions split along partisan lines. Donald Trump politicized US support of Israel, said Halie Soifer, CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America and a former national security adviser to then-Sen. Kamala Harris.

Thats why you see congressional Democrats with more willingness to lambaste Israel.

Take Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE), a close Biden confidant who fashions himself one of Israels strongest supporters in Congress. He used a Twitter thread to denounce Hamass rocket attacks but also called out Israel for the attempted evictions of Palestinians in East Jerusalem and other provocations.

Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY), a Jewish lawmaker and chair of the House Judiciary Committee, also issued a statement criticizing aggression by Israeli authorities last week that helped trigger the current conflict: I remain deeply concerned by the violence in Jerusalem, including Israeli police violence, and I urge all parties to exercise restraints.

Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT), chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committees Middle East panel, told me its important for members of Congress to acknowledge that over the last few years, both the Palestinians and Israelis have taken a bunch of steps to make a two-state future less likely and create cultures of grievances.

Instead of making a big deal out of noting the Palestinian plight or finding ways to punish Israel, though, he said the goal is to seek deescalation. Were in the middle of a nightmare right now. People are dying, he said. Once the crisis is over, then it makes sense to have a broader policy discussion about Americas stance toward Israel.

But given the way the administration is acting so far, it doesnt look like it wants to have that discussion at all.

The Biden administration rejects accusations that its taking only Israels side or that its standing pat as rockets and bombs rip through civilian buildings in Israel and Gaza.

On Tuesday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said US officials have spoken candidly with Israeli officials about how evictions of Palestinian families who have lived for years, sometimes decades, in their homes and of demolitions of these homes work against our common interests in achieving a solution to the conflict.

The next day, she told reporters US officials had held 25 high-level calls and meetings with Israeli and Palestinian leaders, as well as other regional governments with stakes in the conflict. So our engagement is, a lot of it is happening privately through diplomatic channels, she said, and our objective here is deescalation as we look to protecting the people in the region.

Thats all well and good, experts say, but they say itd be better if Biden came out and showed support for Palestinians himself. I think its reached a point where that might not be a bad idea, said Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of the liberal pro-Israel advocacy group J Street, after I asked him about the presidents silence. But Ben-Ami added, hes not going to focus on this day in and day out.

At a minimum, theyd like to see Biden do something anything, really.

For the moment, he has yet to appoint a special envoy for the peace process or an ambassador to Israel, though a State Department official is headed to the region to speak with regional leaders. Psaki said Wednesday that the president will name someone to the ambassadorial post in the coming weeks.

Meanwhile, Biden has barely reversed Trumps actions against the Palestinians, except for restoring aid to refugees. When the US acted recently, it was to block a statement by the United Nations Security Council on the conflict. The US doesnt see that a statement will help de-escalate, an unnamed diplomat told AFP on Wednesday.

There doesnt seem to be a sense of urgency in the administration. Congressional aides and activists who have recently spoken to the White House told me the attitude of Bidens team is theres a lot going on right now.

In all fairness, there is.

Biden is still contending with the Covid-19 pandemic at home and now looking to quash it abroad, all while trying to push trillions in domestic programs through Congress. Blasting Israel could harm his standing with Republicans.

Biden also has diplomats negotiating Americas reentry into the Iran nuclear deal, a pact Israel hates and might speak openly against if the president publicly denounces Jerusalem.

Whats more, the US is far from being the only outside influence over the crisis.

Ilan Goldenberg, an expert on the Israeli-Palestinian issue at the Center for a New American Security think tank in Washington, DC, tweeted on Wednesday that The key mediators in this conflict and the ones with real leverage with Hamas and a close relationship with the Israelis are the Egyptians. Ultimately this round of violence will most likely end with an agreement in Cairo, not the White House.

Between those considerations and Bidens more traditional view of the US-Israel relationship, its possible the president simply wants to stay out of the fray.

But thats concerning, as most say a clear statement from Biden denouncing Hamass attacks but also noting Israels complicity in the violence might get Jerusalem to consider deescalating this crisis. After that, Biden could hold Israel accountable for its human rights abuses with the same vigor as his team does Hamas and other Palestinian leaders.

His silence on that front for now, at least has consequences.

The permanent occupation of Palestinian territory by the state of Israel, and millions of people in the occupied territory, held for decades and generations without rights remains an unsustainable situation, said J Streets Ben-Ami. That will lead to these regular outbreaks of violence if there is not an effort consistently made to, at a minimum, prevent the situation from getting worse.

See the article here:

The Democratic rift on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: Biden isnt moving left yet - Vox.com

The Census Bureau released two important sets of data last week that have big implications for American politics and that challenge some prevailing assumptions for both Democrats and Republicans.

The first set of data lays out long-term demographic trends widely thought to favor Democrats: Hispanics, Asian-Americans and multiracial voters grew as a share of the electorate over the last two presidential races, and white voters who historically tend to back the G.O.P. fell to 71 percent in 2020 from 73 percent in 2016.

The other data set tells a second story. Population growth continues to accelerate in the South and the West, so much so that some Republican-leaning states in those regions are gaining more Electoral College votes. The states won by President Biden will be worth 303 electoral votes, down from 306 electoral votes in 2020. The Democratic disadvantage in the Electoral College just got worse again.

These demographic and population shifts are powerfully clarifying about electoral politics in America: The increasing racial diversity among voters isnt doing quite as much to help Democrats as liberals hope, or to hurt Republicans as much as conservatives fear.

The expanding Democratic disadvantage in the Electoral College underscores how the growing diversity of the nation may not aid Democrats enough to win in places they most need help. Just as often, population growth is concentrated in red states like Texas and Florida where the Democrats dont win nonwhite voters by the overwhelming margins necessary to overcome the states Republican advantage.

As for the Republicans, the widely held assumption that the party will struggle as white voters decline as a percentage of the electorate may be more myth than reality. Contrary to what Tucker Carlson says repeatedly on Fox News about the rise of white replacement theory as a Democratic electoral strategy, the countrys growing racial diversity has not drastically upended the partys chances. Instead, Republicans face a challenge they often take for granted: white voters.

One way to think about this is to compare todays electorate with that of the 1980s, when Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush were winning in landslides. Democrats, no doubt, have benefited from the increased racial diversity of the country since then: Mr. Biden would not have even come close to winning Georgia in November if its voters were as white they were back in the 1980s. Former President Donald J. Trump would have probably won re-election if he could have turned the demographic clock back to the 80s and reduced the electoral clout of nonwhite voters. Todays wave of Republican-backed laws restricting voting rights may be intended to do exactly that.

Yet even a return to the racial demographics of the 1980s wouldnt do nearly as much to hurt Democrats as one might expect. Yes, the November result would have gone from an extremely close win for Mr. Biden to an extremely close win for Mr. Trump. But Mr. Biden would have won more electoral votes than Hillary Clinton did in 2016, even though nonwhite voters had doubled their share of the electorate from 1984 to when Mrs. Clinton sought the presidency. Remarkably, Mr. Bidens fairly modest gains among white voters helped him as much as the last 30 to 40 years of demographic shifts did.

Similarly, Mr. Bush or Mr. Reagan would have still prevailed if they had had to win an electorate that was 29 percent nonwhite, as opposed to the merely 13 to 15 percent nonwhite electorates they sought to persuade at the time.

This is not the conventional story of recent electoral history. In the usual tale, the growing racial diversity of the electorate broke the Reagan and Bush majorities and allowed the Democrats to win the national popular vote in seven of the next eight presidential elections.

And yet it is hard to find a single state where the increasing racial diversity of the electorate, even over an exceptionally long 30- or 40-year period, has been both necessary and sufficient for Democrats to flip a state from red to blue. Even in states where Democrats have needed demographic changes to win, like Georgia and Arizona, the party has also needed significant improvement among white voters to get over the top.

One reason demographic change has failed to transform electoral politics is that the increased diversity of the electorate has come not mainly from Black voters but from Hispanic, Asian-American and multiracial voters. Those groups back Democrats, but not always by overwhelmingly large margins.

In 2020, Democrats probably won around 60 to 65 percent of voters across these demographic groups. These are substantial margins, but they are small enough that even decades of demographic shifts wind up costing the Republicans only a couple of percentage points.

The new census datas finding that the percentage of non-Hispanic white voters in the countrys electorate dropped by about two percentage points from 2016 to 2020 might seem like a lot. But with Hispanic, Asian-American and multiracial voters representing the entirety of the increase, while the Black share of the electorate was flat, the growing nonwhite share of the electorate cost Mr. Trump only about half a percentage point over a four-year period.

Another factor is the electoral map. The American electoral system rewards flipping states from red to blue, but many Democratic gains among nonwhite voters have been concentrated in the major cities of big and often noncompetitive states. By contrast, many traditional swing states across the northern tier, like Wisconsin or Pennsylvania, have had relatively little demographic change.

The ability of Democrats to flip red states has been hampered by another pattern: the tendency for Republicans to fare relatively well among nonwhite voters in red states.

Its often said that Latino voters arent a monolith, and thats certainly true. While Hispanic voters back Democrats by overwhelming margins in blue states like New York and Illinois, Republicans are often far more competitive among Latinos and members of other non-Black minority groups in red states including those Democrats now hope to flip like Texas or Florida.

Texas and Florida really would be blue if Latinos voted like their counterparts in New York or Illinois. But instead, Latino population growth has not quite had a strong pro-Democratic punch in the states where the party hoped to land a knockout blow.

At the same time, white voters are easy to overlook as a source of Democratic gains, given that these voters still support Republicans by a comfortable margin. But Democrats probably improved from 39 to 43 percent among white voters from 1988 to 2020. Its a significant shift, and perhaps even enough to cover the entirety of Mr. Bushs margin of victory in the 1988 election, without any demographic change whatsoever.

Its a little easier to see the significance of Democratic gains among white voters at the state level. According to AP/Votecast data, Mr. Biden won white voters in states worth 211 electoral votes. Democrats like Jimmy Carter in 1976, Michael Dukakis in 1988 or John Kerry in 2004 probably didnt win white voters in states worth much more than 60 electoral votes, based on exit poll and other survey data.

Mr. Biden even won white voters in many of the states where the growing diversity of the electorate is thought to be the main source of new Democratic strength, including California and Colorado. And he also won white voters in many big, diverse states across the North where Republicans used to win and where nonwhite demographic change might otherwise be considered the decisive source of Democratic strength, like Illinois, New Jersey, Connecticut and Maryland, which voted almost entirely Republican at the presidential level throughout the 1980s.

According to the AP/Votecast data, Mr. Biden won seven states Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Virginia, Arizona, Nevada and Georgia while losing among white voters. In these crucial states, Democratic strength among nonwhite voters was essential to Mr. Bidens victory.

But of these states, there are really only three where Mr. Biden clearly prevailed by the margin of the increased racial diversity of the electorate over the last few decades: Arizona, Nevada and Georgia. He did not need to win any of these states to capture the presidency, but he would not have done so without long-term increases in both nonwhite voting power and Democratic strength among white voters.

The story is quite different in the Northern battleground states. White voters still represent more than 80 percent of the electorate in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, according to the new census data. The nonwhite population in these states is predominantly Black; their share of the population has been fairly steady over the last few decades. But Mr. Biden won these states so narrowly that the relatively modest demographic shifts of the last few decades were necessary for him to prevail in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.

Its just hard to call it a Great Replacement if Mr. Trump could have won in 2020 if only he had done as well among white voters as he did in 2016.

Read the original:

Why Rising Diversity Might Not Help Democrats as Much as They Hope - The New York Times

Congressional Democrats and the Biden White House have made no secret of their interest in passing a sweeping immigration reform package. Among the biggest hurdles, of course, is the same obstacle to passing nearly all legislation: Senate Republicans will try to block any reform bill, and coming up with a 60-vote supermajority is practically impossible.

But what if the Democratic majority could circumvent a GOP filibuster by using the budget reconciliation process -- the same method the party used to pass the COVID relief package?

In early April, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) suggested Dems are prepared to do exactly that. Two weeks later, a group of Hispanic lawmakers met privately with President Joe Biden, and after the discussion, Rep. Darren Soto (D-Fla.) told Politico that Biden told the group he generally "supports passing certain immigration reforms by reconciliation if we can't get the 10 Republican votes."

Last week, Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the #3 Democrat in the Senate leadership, raised a few eyebrows with a press release in which she said, "After years of working to reach agreement on a solution, it's clear to me we can't miss the opportunity to act in this critical moment. We need to look at every legislative path possible to get comprehensive immigration reform done -- including through reconciliation."

It's against this backdrop that the New York Times reported overnight that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) is "quietly considering" the procedural gambit.

Mr. Schumer has privately told members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus in recent weeks that he is "actively exploring" whether it would be possible to attach a broad revision of immigration laws to President Biden's infrastructure plan and pass it through a process known as budget reconciliation, according to two people briefed on his comments.

It's worth emphasizing that this would likely be Plan B for Democratic leaders. Plan A is the ongoing negotiating process underway among a bipartisan group of 15 senators, exploring the possibility of a compromise agreement.

Such a deal appears unlikely. Indeed, the Times' report added that observers have watched the negotiations "drag on with little agreement in sight." There's no great mystery as to why.

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), one of the 15 senators involved in the bipartisan talks, said, "Before we can do anything meaningful on immigration, we're going to have to deal with the current crisis at the border."

If this seems like hollow rhetoric, it's not your imagination. For much of the last two decades, conservative Republicans have said there's a "crisis" that needs to be resolved before GOP lawmakers will consider reform legislation. And every time border security is strengthened, those same Republicans insist it's not enough.

Indeed, let's not forget that GOP members promised then-President Barack Obama that they'd consider a comprehensive immigration solution if he vastly improved border security. The Democrat held up his end of the bargain; the Senate passed the "Gang of Eight" bill; but House Republicans ended up killing the reform effort anyway, offering nothing as an alternative. (See Chapter 6 of my book.)

The GOP position has a Zeno's paradox-like problem: There's no way to ever actually reach the point at which Republicans are satisfied that the "crisis" has been fully resolved. As Greg Sargent noted this morning, "Does anybody imagine there will come a point when Republicans will say, 'Okay, Biden's totally got the border under control now, so let's get serious about working with Democrats on legalizing a lot of immigrants'? Of course not."

But then there's an entirely different question to consider: Is it even procedurally possible to pursue immigration reform through the budget reconciliation process, which is supposed to be limited to matters of taxes and spending? I've been skeptical, but the Times' report included an important detail from 16 years ago that I'd forgotten about:

A team of immigration activists and researchers as well as congressional aides is exploring the question, digging into the best way to present their case to [Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough].... They have found past precedents, including one from 2005, in which changes to immigration policy were allowed as part of a budget-reconciliation package, and they are tallying up the budgetary effects of the immigration proposals which total in the tens of billions. Researchers have dredged up supportive quotes from Republicans from 2005, when they won signoff for including a measure to recapture unused visas for high-skilled workers in a reconciliation package.

There's no shortage of unanswered questions related to process, politics, and procedure, and it'll take a while before the answers come into focus. But for now, it's clear that Democratic leaders are committed to the effort, and the door to immigration reform is not yet closed. Watch this space.

View original post here:

Democrats eye a creative approach to passing immigration reform - MSNBC

The four Colorado Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives have assembled a list of nearly $200 million in special spending on transportation initiatives and community projects in their districts as Congress reopens the door to the controversial practice of earmarking.

The Colorado projects in an expected $2 trillion infrastructure bill range from $20,000 for Denvers Mi Casa Resource Center to $29.2 million to rebuild the Interstate 70 and Airpark Road interchange east of the city.

Its been 10 years since Congress ended earmarks, the practice of allowing individual members to designate funding for projects in their districts. Scandals and controversy surrounding the spending practice led to its demise, and conservatives remain skeptical of earmarks.

Republicans in conservative districts have disavowed the practice, including the three GOP U.S. representatives from Colorado. That could mean Colorado Springs and the states rural areas lose out on some funding opportunities.

Its been a party-line thing, where if you want to show youre a good GOP member you denounce earmarks, said Kevin Kosar, a scholar specializing in governance for the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank. If they go after earmarks, they may hurt their small-government cred.

But the projects may be key to getting Democratic President Joe Bidens $2 trillion infrastructure plan through Congress.

The House adopted earmark guidelines for community projects and transportation projects prohibiting conflicts of interest and money going to for-profit organizations. Those rules require House members to post information about their projects on their official webpages, which all the Democrats have done.

Kosar praised those measures. I think this system, assuming they continue to roll it out well, is going to be so much better than the old system, not least because it requires transparency.

The Senate has yet to create guidelines for projects, so Colorados Sens. John Hickenlooper and Michael Bennet have yet to identify any theyll include in infrastructure bills. Both Democrats are expected to have earmarks, too.

There are no guarantees the designated projects will be included in final spending bills. But the earmarks are a good start toward funding.

Kosar said the projects will be reviewed by the Government Accountability Office to see if there are boondoggles in there.

That is going to force members of Congress to be selective, he said.

U.S. Rep. Jason Crow, an Aurora Democrat, has the most costly list of projects, including a $29.2 million request to rebuild the Interstate 70 and Airpark Road interchange near Denver International Airport.

Crow is also requesting $22.4 million for the Interstate 76 and Bridge Street interchange in Brighton and $10 million for the Interstate 25 and Belleview Avenue interchange in Arapahoe County.

Transit and homelessness is a focus for U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, a Denver Democrat. Shes asking for $13.5 million to renovate Broadway Station at I-25, and $7.9 million for central corridor rail replacement on behalf of RTD.

Another $10 million requested by DeGette would go toward rebuilding a shelter for Urban Peak, an organization that serves homeless youth in Denver.

The funding requests weve made this year focus on several important issues facing the district including homelessness and improvements to our light rail, DeGette said in a written statement. If approved, this funding will have a significant impact on our community in a wide range of ways.

Want exclusive Colorado political news and analysis? Subscribe here to get The Unaffiliated, the twice-weekly political newsletter from The Colorado Sun.

The top project for U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter, of Arvada, is $10 million to widen Wadsworth Boulevard in Wheat Ridge between West 35th Avenue and I-70.

Congressionally-directed spending provides an opportunity to advocate on behalf of the cities, counties and nonprofits in my district and work to secure the funding they need to make critical investments in our community and better serve Coloradans, Perlmutter said in a written statement.

Lafayette Democratic U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse asked for the least amount of funding, at $27.6 million. His most expensive request is $6.7 million for a transit center in Frisco.

Take a look at a searchable list of projects submitted by the four Democrats:

Republican U.S. Reps. Doug Lamborn, of Colorado Springs, Ken Buck, of Windsor, and Lauren Boebert, of Garfield County, didnt submit earmarked projects.

Buck and Boebert signed a pledge against earmarks, along with 27 other Republicans, calling them a corrupting practice.

Congressman Buck does not support carving out earmarks for special interests, Bucks spokeswoman, Lindsey Curnette, said in a written statement. Stakeholders in Colorados 4th District are able to submit requests under the regular appropriations process.

Boeberts been a frequent critic of the spending practice, signing on to another letter in March with 24 House members and 10 senators to emphasize her opposition.

Lamborn didnt sign either anti-earmark letter. But he also didntdesignateany projects.

The Sun inquired with Lamborns office about a blank webpage on his official website titled Community Funded Projects. The page changed to say Page Not Found after The Suns inquiry.

As of now, Congressman Lamborns office will not be working on community-funded projects, Cassandra Sebastian, Lamborns spokeswoman, said in an email.

That may disappoint some of the Republicans constituents.

Cathy Shull, executive director of Pro 15, a group that advocates for northeastern Colorado, said rural counties expect to get some benefits from the infrastructure measures being pushed by Democrats. But getting earmarks would provide even more help, she said.

Our group is not a big fan of earmarks, but we hate being left out, she said. Somebodys going to get them. A little extra boost from the federal government would have been really nice.

CORRECTION: This story was updated at 10:22 a.m. on Tuesday, May 4, 2021, to correct a statement about a news release from Doug Lamborn on earmarks. Lamborn didnt sign either anti-earmark letter signed by other Colorado Republicans in the U.S. House. But he also didntdesignateany projects.

The Colorado Sun has no paywall, meaning readers do not have to pay to access stories. We believe vital information needs to be seen by the people impacted, whether its a public health crisis, investigative reporting or keeping lawmakers accountable.

This reporting depends on support from readers like you. For just $5/month, you can invest in an informed community.

Original post:

Colorado Democrats in the US House want nearly $200 million for earmarked projects - The Colorado Sun

There is this recognition of this moment and how fleeting it is, and an evaluation that, absent the trifecta of control, it is very hard to move big policy, said a senior official at one of the partys leading outside advocacy groups, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal strategizing. So you have to take your shot. I think thats part of what undergirds Go big.

In one sense, past presidents first two years in office offer Biden and congressional Democrats reason to be optimistic about executing their plans. Looked at another way, though, that history is discouraging, dauntingly so.

Whats encouraging is how past presidents have managed to push through important parts of their agenda. Presidents dont get everything they want during that initial two-year period. Clinton, for instance, failed to pass comprehensive health-care reform, and Donald Trump failed to repeal the comprehensive reform that Obama did passthe Affordable Care Act. But presidents whose party controls Congress typically do pass some version of their core economic proposals during their first two years, even if it usually happens after some significant remodeling.

Trump and George W. Bush each pushed massive tax cuts through a Republican-controlled Congress during their first year in office. In his first months, Ronald Reagan muscled through a landmark tax reduction, despite a Congress divided between a Republican Senate and a Democratic House. With the support of a Democratic-controlled Congress, Obama signed both a large economic-stimulus package and the ACA, and Clinton, by the narrowest possible margins, likewise enacted his deficit-reduction and public-investment plans.

David Frum: The Trump policy that Biden is extending

In each of these cases, the president was compelled to abandon or trim key elements of his blueprint. Congress forced Clinton to jettison his BTU tax (an early attempt to tax energy consumption) and accept the creation of a commission to study entitlement cuts. Dissent from two moderate Republican senators forced Bush to slash his tax cut by nearly one-fourth. Obama was compelled to reduce his stimulus spending to win over Senate Republican votes, and to drop the ACAs public option to obtain the last Democratic votes he needed. Even Reagans watershed reductions in personal-income-tax rates were scaled back. Yet while these concessions were seen at the time as major setbacks, they are now remembered, if at all, as merely smudges on legislative achievements that rank among each of these presidents most consequential.

This history augurs well for Congress eventually approving some version of the infrastructure and human-capital plans Biden touted last night, even if the plans are adjusted to win approval from the Democratic Partys most conservative senators, such as West Virginias Joe Manchin. (Democrats can pass most of Bidens economic agenda through the reconciliation process, which requires only a simple-majority vote in the Senate. His noneconomic priorities face much dimmer prospects of passing in the upper chamber, unless Senate Democrats agree to curtail the filibuster.) Democrats often blame the devastating losses Obama suffered in 2010he lost more House seats than any president in a midterm since 1938on his administrations overly cautious approach, and they dont want to repeat that mistake. Trying to placate the Republicans with a bunch of tax cuts and going for a more modest package, thinking that would gain support, turned out to be dead wrong, Price told me. You got a weaker bill and no bipartisan support: the worst of both worlds. We are trying to get a stronger bill and assuming the net effect will be to increase pressure on Republicans who are opposing it.

Here is the original post:

Biden Address: Can Democrats Keep the House in 2022? - The Atlantic

If the last public poll was any indicator, Virginia Democrats still have lots of homework to do before making their picks in the primary for lieutenant governor.

A Christopher Newport University poll conducted in mid-April found 64 percent of likely primary voters undecided in the race, with Del. Sam Rasoul, D-Roanoke, the apparent leader with 12 percent support.

Were glad to see the way things are trending, Rasoul said in an interview, attributing his leading status to a values-based campaign focused on in-person trips to cities and counties throughout Virginia, including areas where voters feel forgotten.

The numbers suggest theres still lots of room for movement in an open field that once stood at eight candidates but has shrunk to six heading into the final month before the June 8 primary.

The other five candidates still in the race Del. Hala Ayala, Del. Mark Levine, former Fairfax County NAACP leader Sean Perryman, Norfolk City Councilwoman Andria McClellan and businessman Xavier Warren all had 1 or 2 percent support, the CNU poll found.

I think its anybodys game, McClellan said in a recent interview.

With a crowded primary for governor happening at the same time, said longtime Virginia political analyst Bob Holsworth, it can be difficult for candidates running in a downballot contest to try to build a statewide profile.

Many of these people are unknown outside of their own region, Holsworth said.

Candidates are just starting to roll out their first TV ads, and the arrival of warm weather is giving them more freedom to do socially distanced events rather than campaigning via computer screen.

Part of the challenge for candidates running for lieutenant governor is explaining just what it is the lieutenant governor does. The mostly ceremonial job involves presiding over the state Senate and breaking ties in the upper chamber, as current Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax recently did to pass legislation legalizing marijuana. The lieutenant governor can advocate for certain causes, but has limited policymaking power. But if the governor becomes incapacitated, the lieutenant governor steps in to run the state, and the role has traditionally been seen as a launchpad to higher office.

Rasoul, a rare western Virginia progressive who has at times criticized his party for what he sees as an inability to connect with voters outside traditional Democratic strongholds, also led the field in the most recent fundraising period, reporting more than $950,000 on hand as of March 31.

I know we have many candidates to choose from, Rasoul said. We feel as though we are a true voice of the people. Thats the way I have legislated and voted over the past eight years.

Shortly after those campaign finance numbers came out, Del. Elizabeth Guzman, D-Prince William, one of two Latinas in the race, announced she was dropping her bid for statewide office to focus on winning another term in her House of Delegates district, where shes facing a strong primary challenge from Democrat Rod Hall.

Paul Goldman, a onetime aide to former Gov. Doug Wilder, dropped out of the lieutenant governor race early last month.

Guzmans departure seemed to free Democratic leaders to jump in and endorse Ayala, D-Prince William, who had already chosen not to seek another term in the House and could help Democrats avoid an all-male ticket in a year when former Gov. Terry McAuliffe and Attorney General Mark Herring are trying to keep or return to offices theyve held before. Ayala, who identifies as Afro-Latina and is a member of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus, would be the first woman of color to serve in statewide office.

Late last month, Ayala was endorsed by Gov. Ralph Northam, House Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn and House Majority Leader Charniele Herring, all of whom are backing McAuliffe for governor over two other competitors, Sen. Jennifer McClellan and former delegate Jennifer Carroll Foy, who are both vying to be the first Black woman elected governor of any state.

In a news release from Ayalas campaign, Filler-Corn said Ayala would bring historic representation to the highest levels of our state government.

Ayala campaign manager Veronica Ingham said Ayala is in a strong position heading into the final month, with the big endorsements underscoring the relationships Ayala, a former activist, has built since joining the House as part of the Democratic wave of 2017.

We know that voters want to make history and elect the first woman of color to the lieutenant governor position, Ingham said.

State Democrats have largely credited women, particularly women of color, as a driving force behind electoral successes that allowed the party to take full control of the statehouse for the first time in decades.

They are the mainstay of the coalition, said Holsworth. In this instance, with McAuliffe being what seems to be a relatively clear favorite at the top of the ticket, the diversity, if the Democrats are going to have it, is going to have to come from the LG race or the AG race. Or both.

In the primary for attorney general, Del. Jay Jones, D-Norfolk, is challenging Attorney General Mark Herring. Jones would be Virginias first Black attorney general, but the CNU poll showed Herring maintaining a fairly comfortable lead, with 42 percent support compared to 18 percent for Jones.

Holsworth said hes usually skeptical of the impact of endorsements, but party leaders rallying behind Ayala could give her a boost in a field of relative unknowns with no incumbent in the mix.

THE MORNING NEWSLETTER

Subscribe now.

My sense is that him putting his thumb on the scale there is likely to have an impact, Holsworth said of Northams backing of Ayala. And its certainly not good news for either Rasoul or the other candidates in the race.

Ayala isnt the only candidate who could diversify the Democratic slate in the lieutenant governor spot.

Apart from Ayala, McClellan is now the only other woman in the race and the only Democrat running for the job from the Hampton Roads area. Energizing the partys base there, she said, could be key to holding the House of Delegates this year. Though shed love to break the glass ceiling and be the first woman elected as lieutenant governor, McClellan said, I want people to vote for me because Im the most qualified.

I think diversity of experience, diversity of background, diversity of geography all should be taken into consideration, she said.

Levine, D-Alexandria, a former radio and TV pundit who has served in the House since 2016, would be the first openly LGBTQ person in statewide office.

Though two Black men have served as lieutenant governor before, both Perryman and Warren would also ensure at least one Black candidate on the Democrats 2021 ticket.

In an interview, Perryman said he thinks its premature to call any candidate a frontrunner given the number of undecided voters.

They dont know Sam Rasoul, Mark Levine, me. They dont know anyone, Perryman said. Theyre just sort of going about their lives trying to get by.

Perryman, who has endorsements from most of the county board in vote-rich Fairfax, said he doubts Democratic leaders embrace of Ayala will have a major impact.

Everyone I think saw clearly that it was an attempt to prop up a candidate and pick favorites in this race, Perryman said. And I dont think theres an appetite for that.

HELP US GROW

Make a tax-deductible donation.

Read more:

'Anybody's game': Democratic LG candidates still working to introduce themselves to Virginia voters - Virginia Mercury

LONDON The Group of 7 was created to help coordinate economic policy among the worlds top industrial powers. In the four decades since, it has acted to combat energy shortages, global poverty and financial crises.

But as Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken meets with fellow Group of 7 foreign ministers in London this week, a key item on the agenda will be what Mr. Blinken called, in remarks to the press on Monday, defending democratic values and open societies.

Implicitly, that defense is against China and, to a lesser extent, Russia. While the economic and public tasks of recovering from the coronavirus remain paramount, Mr. Blinken is also employing the Group of 7 composed of the United States, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and Japan to coordinate with allies in an emerging global competition between democracy and the authoritarian visions of Moscow and Beijing.

One twist in the meeting this week is the presence of nations that are not formal Group of 7 members: India, South Korea, Australia and South Africa. Also in attendance is Brunei, the current chair of the Association of South East Asian Nations.

It is no coincidence that those guest nations are in the Indo-Pacific region, making them central to Western efforts to grapple with Beijings growing economic might and territorial ambition. China was the subject of a 90-minute opening session on Tuesday morning, and the schedule concluded with a group dinner on the Indo-Pacific.

The broader context for these meetings is China, and the authoritarian challenge that China presents to the democratic world, said Ash Jain, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council.

Mr. Jain noted the way the group is now emphasizing common values over shared economic interests. The G-7 is being rebranded as a group of like-minded democracies, as opposed to a group of highly industrialized nations. Theyre changing the emphasis, he said.

Many of the countries represented at the meeting do big business with China and Russia, complicating efforts to align them against those nations. Chinas pattern of economic coercion was one specific topic of conversation on Tuesday, participants said.

But those efforts have been simplified by the departure of President Donald J. Trump, who repeatedly picked fights with Group of 7 allies and confounded them with calls to restore Russia, which was expelled in 2014 from what was then the Group of 8 after its annexation of Crimea from Ukraine.

Nor is it likely a coincidence that the expanded guest list matches, with the additions of South Africa and Brunei, a group of 10 countries and the European Union, collectively short-handed as the D-10 by proponents of organizing them in a new world body. Those proponents include Prime Minister Boris Johnson of Britain, the host of this weeks gathering and architect of its guest list.

Mr. Johnson has also invited India, Australia and South Korea to send their heads of state to this summers Group of 7 summit in Cornwall, citing his ambition to work with a group of like-minded democracies to advance shared interests and tackle common challenges.

President Biden has similarly suggested that the world is grouping into competing camps, divided by the openness of their political systems. In his address to Congress last week, Mr. Biden said that Americas adversaries, the autocrats of the world, are betting that the nations battered democracy cannot be restored.

As a candidate, Mr. Biden also committed to holding a Summit for Democracy during his first year in office, and officials say planning for such an event is underway. Asked in a Tuesday interview with The Financial Times which countries might be invited to such a summit, Mr. Blinken did not answer directly.

And Wednesdays agenda for the gathering includes a session on open societies, including issues of media freedom and disinformation. Other sessions over the two days include Syria, Russia and its neighbors Ukraine and Belarus, Myanmar, and Afghanistan.

Some Group of 7 nations are concerned about the creation of a new global body that might contribute to a Cold War-style polarization along ideological lines.

In a joint news conference on Monday, Mr. Blinken and his British counterpart, Dominic Raab, were cautious not to suggest that they were forming a new club.

Asked whether a new alliance of democracies might be emerging, Mr. Raab said he did not see things in such theological terms, but did see a growing need for agile clusters of like-minded countries that share the same values and want to protect the multilateral system.

Addressing the same question, Mr. Blinken was careful to insist that this weeks meetings did not amount to plotting against Beijing.

It is not our purpose to try to contain China, or to hold China down, Mr. Blinken said. What we are trying to do is to uphold the international rules-based order that our countries have invested so much in over so many decades, to the benefit, I would argue, not just of our own citizens, but of people around the world including, by the way, China. (The line is not just for public consumption. U.S. diplomats have relayed the same message privately, almost verbatim, to foreign counterparts.)

But in an interview with CBSs 60 Minutes broadcast the night before, Mr. Blinken made clear how the United States views Chinas rise.

I think that over time, China believes that it can be and should be and will be the dominant country in the world, Mr. Blinken said. China is challenging the international order, he said, adding that were going to stand up and defend it.

Jeremy Shapiro, a former State Department official in the Obama administration who is now research director at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said that informally expanding the Group of 7 is far easier than constructing a new body.

It is always a pain, from a governmental perspective, to invent a new forum, because you need to have an endless discussion about whos in and whos out, and how it works, and its relationship to the U.N., Mr. Shapiro said.

He added that the Group of 7, whose mission had grown nebulous in recent years, may have acquired a new sense of purpose as it tries to organize a post-Trump democratic world in the face of Chinese and Russian threats.

You would be hard-pressed to look back the past five years or more since they kicked out Russia to name a single thing the G-7 has done of interest, Mr. Shapiro said. It didnt have much to do.

See the original post:

Blinken and G-7 Allies Turn Their Focus to Democratic Values - The New York Times

AUSTIN, Texas Democrats hoping for some encouraging signs in Texas did not find any on Saturday in a special election to fill a vacant congressional seat. Instead, they found themselves locked out of a runoff that will now see two Republicans battle for the seat in northern Texas.

The two Republicans Susan Wright, who was endorsed by President Donald J. Trump, and State Representative Jake Ellzey emerged as the top vote-getters in a 23-candidate, all-party special election to replace Mrs. Wrights husband, U.S. Representative Ron Wright, who this year became the first congressman to die of Covid-19.

Jana Lynne Sanchez, a Democrat who made a surprisingly strong showing for the seat in 2018 and was considered by many as a likely cinch for the runoff, came in a close third, leaving the two Republicans to fight for the seat that their party has controlled for nearly four decades.

Democrats who needed a strong turnout to be competitive did not get one. They were hoping for signs of weakness in the Republican brand because of the states disastrous response to the brutal winter storm in February or any signs of weariness with Mr. Trump, but they did not see that, either.

Michael Wood, a small-business man and Marine veteran who gained national attention as the only openly anti-Trump Republican in the field, picked up only 3 percent of the vote.

Democrats have not won a statewide race in Texas since 1994. When the seat is filled, Texas house delegation will be 23 Republicans and 13 Democrats.

The Republicans turned out and the Democrats didnt, said Cal Jillson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. Thats a critical takeaway. The party has to think very systematically about whats wrong and what they need to change in order to be successful.

Since 1983, Republicans have held seat, in Texas Sixth Congressional District, which includes mostly rural areas in three northern Texas counties and a sliver of the nations fourth-largest metropolitan region around Dallas, Fort Worth and Arlington.

But growing numbers of Hispanics and African-Americans fueled Democrats hopes that they had a strong shot of at least getting into a runoff. Mr. Trump won the district by only 3 points in November. Ms. Sanchez, who grew up in the district and built a strong political organization, was widely portrayed as the lead contender in the field of 10 Democrats.

But in the end, she came up 354 votes short after the Democrats splintered the partys vote, and Mr. Ellzey nudged her aside for the runoff. Mrs. Wright won 19.2 percent of the vote to Mr. Ellzeys 13.8 percent. Ms. Sanchez got 13.4 percent of the vote.

The large field may have cost Ms. Sanchez a runoff spot, but in the end Republicans won 62 percent of the vote and Democrats 37 percent, not auspicious numbers for her hopes of winning if she did get in the runoff.

Democrats have come a long way toward competing in Texas but we still have a way to go, Ms. Sanchez said in a concession statement on Sunday morning.

She said: Well keep fighting for a healthier, equitable and prosperous Texas and to elect leaders who care about meeting the needs of Texans, although it wont happen in this district immediately.

The Republican runoff was already showing signs of being fought along familiar right-of-center turf.

Ms. Wrights general consultant, Matt Langston, assailed Mr. Ellzey, a former Navy pilot who was endorsed by former Gov. Rick Perry, as an opportunistic RINO a Republican in Name Only.

And one of her prominent supporters, David McIntosh, president of the conservative Club for Growth, which has spent more than $350,000 on mail, social media and texts against Mr. Ellzeys bid, on Sunday called on the second-place candidate to pull out of the race. He said it was more important for Republicans to unite behind Mrs. Wrights candidacy in advance of the critical midterm congressional races next year.

If he wants to unite, stop attacking, said Craig Murphy, Mr. Ellzeys spokesman, firmly rebuffing Mr. McIntoshs proposal. Mr. Murphy also denounced Mr. Langstons statement against his candidate as silly and insulting and described Mr. Ellzey as a guy who has been under enemy fire eight times.

The defeat in the special election in some respects evoked the 2020 elections in Texas, when Democrats believed that demographic changes put them in reach of a potential blue wave to possibly take over the Republican-controlled state House of Representatives and flip several congressional seats. Instead, the blue wave never washed ashore, and the House remains in Republicans hands by the same margin as before.

The Sixth District was once a Democratic stronghold, until Phil Gramm, formerly a conservative Democrat, switched party affiliations in 1983. The district has been a reliable Republican bastion ever since.

The seat came open in February after Mr. Wright, who had lung cancer, died after he contracted the coronavirus. His wife was an early front-runner to replace him, but her chances of outright victory narrowed after the field grew to 23 candidates: 11 Republicans, 10 Democrats, a Libertarian and an independent.

See the rest here:

For Democrats, Another Bad Election Night in Texas - The New York Times

When Joseph R. Biden Jr. served as vice president in the Obama administration, he was known to preface his recommendations to other officials with a self-deprecating disclaimer. He may not have attended Harvard or Yale, Mr. Biden would say as he popped into an office or a meeting, but he was still a foreign policy expert, and he knew how to work Capitol Hill.

Mr. Biden isnt apologizing anymore.

Now 100 days into his presidency, Mr. Biden is driving the biggest expansion of American government in decades, an effort to use $6 trillion in federal spending to address social and economic challenges at a scale not seen in a half-century. Aides say he has come into his own as a party leader in ways that his uneven political career didnt always foretell, and that he is undeterred by matters that used to bother him, like having no Republican support for Democratic priorities.

For an establishment politician who cast his election campaign as a restoration of political norms, his record so far amounts to the kind of revolution that he said last year he would not pursue as president but that, aides say, became necessary to respond to a crippling pandemic. In doing so, Mr. Biden is validating the desires of a party that feels fiercely emboldened to push a liberal agenda through a polarized Congress.

The result is something few people expected: His presidency is transforming what it means to be a Democrat, even among a conservative wing of his party that spent decades preaching the gospel of bipartisanship.

Weve been very happy with his agenda and were the moderates, said Matt Bennett, a co-founder of Third Way, a Democratic think tank named after a governing style embraced by former President Bill Clinton that rejected liberal orthodoxy. Some have said this is a liberal wish list. We would argue that he is defining what it is to be a 21st-century moderate Democrat.

Mr. Biden trumpeted his expansive agenda again on Wednesday night in his first address to Congress, casting his efforts to expand vaccinations and pour trillions of dollars into the economy as a way to unify a fractured nation.

Were vaccinating the nation; were creating hundreds of thousands of new jobs, he said. Were delivering real results to people they can see it and feel it in their own lives.

Mr. Biden, now 78, has pursued these sweeping changes without completely losing his instinct for finding the center point of his party. As the Democratic consensus on issues has moved left over the years, he has kept pace on abortion, gun control, same-sex marriage, the Iraq war and criminal justice without going all the way to the furthest liberal stance. Now, he is leading a party that accelerated leftward during the Trump administration, and finding his own place on the Democratic spectrum the one with the most likelihood of legacy-cementing success.

In private calls with Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, whom he vanquished in the Democratic primaries, he collects ideas from the partys liberal wing. With Senator Joe Manchin, the centrist West Virginia Democrat, he keeps tabs on his caucus and its slim congressional margins. And in conversations with Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican minority leader and a longtime negotiating partner, Mr. Biden appeals for bipartisan support, even as he warns that he wont wait for it indefinitely.

Biden is a politician who stays inside of the moment, said Rashad Robinson, president of racial justice organization Color of Change, which was skeptical of Mr. Biden during the primary but now praises his work. He stays inside of where the cultural context has moved.

To the consternation of some Republicans, Mr. Biden is approaching politics differently from recent Democratic presidents who believed that support from the opposing party would provide a bulwark for their policies and political standing. In the 1990s, Mr. Clinton espoused triangulation, a strategy that forced liberals to settle for moderate policies by cutting deals with Republicans. Former President Barack Obama spent months trying to win bipartisan buy-in for his policy proposals.

Both strategies were rooted in political fears that began in the Reagan era: Doing too much to assuage the partys left flank could alienate voters in the middle who took a more skeptical view of government, leaving Democrats unable to build coalitions for re-election.

Mr. Biden and his administration have embraced a different philosophy, arguing that difficult times have made liberal ideas popular with independents and some Republican voters, even if G.O.P. leaders continue to resist them.

The shift leftward, aides say, reflects a recognition by Mr. Biden that the problems facing the country require sweeping solutions, but also that both parties changed during the polarizing years of the Trump administration. Gone is the Senate where Mr. Biden spent decades, legislating like former President Ronald Reagan, who liked to say hed call any negotiation where he could get 70 percent of what he wanted a win.

Theres a difference between President Biden and Senator Biden, said former Senator Chuck Hagel, a Republican who served for decades with Mr. Biden and supported his presidential bid. Even a difference between President Biden and Vice President Biden. Hes the president now and hes got the responsibility of trying to move this country forward. Yes, he wants to do it in a bipartisan way if he can. But the fact is these problems arent going to solve themselves.

Other Republicans see a more dissembling president, one who has broken his promises to reach across the aisle. In a floor speech on Wednesday afternoon, Mr. McConnell accused Mr. Biden of false advertising during his campaign, saying Americans elected a president who preached moderation.

He added: Over a few short months the Biden officials seems to have given up on selling actual unity in favor of catnip for their liberal base.

In his address, Mr. Biden said he was open to hearing Republican ideas on his infrastructure plans but wouldnt wait forever.

I applaud a group of Republican senators who just put forward their proposal, he said. We welcome ideas. But the rest of the world isnt waiting for us. Doing nothing is not an option.

The decades Mr. Biden spent cultivating a moderate image, paired with the conciliatory tone he has adopted toward Republicans in public, has allowed him to push his agenda without facing charges of socialism a label his opponents unsuccessfully tried to make stick during the presidential campaign.

Focus groups throughout the campaign found that voters felt they knew Mr. Biden, both for his family story and working class bona fides. Even now, voters rate Mr. Biden as more moderate than Mr. Obama at the same stage of his presidency, according to polling from NBC News. Mr. Biden is pursuing a more liberal agenda than Mr. Obama did, of course; but he is taking a lower-key approach and advancing relatively popular ideas, and he doesnt face the same smears and attacks as Mr. Obama did as the first Black president.

Its been very artful because its allowed him to create this weird equilibrium where people dont see him as a partisan ramrod, which gives comfort to moderates, said David Axelrod, a former top adviser to Mr. Obama. On the other hand, hes really moving forward on a lot of these initiatives.

Aides and allies say the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol also affected Mr. Bidens thinking about what the country might accept politically. The soon-to-be president believed the violence alienated a slice of voters from Mr. Trumps Republican Party, leaving them more open to Mr. Bidens agenda, particularly if he delivered tangible government benefits like stimulus checks and vaccines.

Its fair to say that Obama followed the Clinton model, and Biden is not, in some fundamental ways, because the world has changed so profoundly, Mr. Bennett said. Joe Biden is dealing with a seditious, anti-democratic set of lunatics. You cant deal with people who voted to overturn the election. You simply cannot, even if youre a moderate.

Mr. Bidens predecessor helped till the ground in other ways. As Mr. Trump focused his attention on waging baseless attacks against the election results last winter, coronavirus cases surged across the country, leaving Americans eager for more economic and public health assistance; Mr. Biden provided that with a $1.9 trillion stimulus bill just a few weeks into his presidency.

Joe Biden is living in a honeymoon with a prenup signed by Donald Trump, said Rahm Emanuel, who was Mr. Obamas chief of staff.

Yet some longtime friends and allies also see a more personal evolution in Mr. Biden since he assumed the role of president.

His inner circle says he is exhibiting a level of confidence theyve never seen before, combined with an awareness that he only has a short window to achieve his goals before next years midterm elections, which could cost Democrats their slim governing majority. While Mr. Biden has said his expectation is that hell run again, political allies privately admit that remains an open question given his age.

Mr. Bidens administration has not given liberals everything theyve wanted, pushing back on proposals to cancel student debt, adopt the entirety of the Green New Deal and completely eliminate the filibuster.

During negotiations with Mr. Sanderss team last summer over a shared platform that would unify Democrats behind Mr. Bidens general election candidacy, Biden aides made clear that they would not accept any recommendations that they didnt believe he could support if elected. At one point, they agreed to decriminalize marijuana but rejected a plan to legalize it completely, saying Mr. Biden didnt agree with that policy, according to a person involved in the talks.

But Mr. Biden didnt treat the negotiations as simply optics, an encouraging sign to many progressives that Mr. Biden and his team were committed to pursuing more-liberal policies than they had realized.

Mr. Bidens advisers said they were perplexed by the progressive zeal over the presidents economic agenda, noting that the American Jobs Plan is exactly what Mr. Biden promised he would do during his campaign. The view from inside the West Wing is that liberals and Republicans both made false assumptions about Mr. Biden and how he would govern.

Aides argue that Mr. Biden hasnt changed from the candidate who just months ago promised to find between four and eight Republican senators to support his policies. Hes still the politician who would be more comfortable compromising on his proposals, getting less than what he wanted, but passing legislation with Republicans on board. He still describes Mr. McConnell as a friend, and thinks he might have come in with a better shot at getting his support than Mr. Obama.

Aides also say he believes that bipartisan support, in the long term, will be more important for the country than passing his $4 trillion infrastructure bills untouched, through reconciliation.

In his heart, he probably still would love to forge bipartisan deals, Mr. Axelrod said. But hes going to be judged at the end of the day not on style points but what he gets done, and he knows that.

Follow this link:

How Biden Is Transforming What It Means to Be a Democrat - The New York Times

Tim Scott, the Republican senator leading negotiations with Democrats over police reform, who insisted during his rebuttal to Joe Bidens address to Congress the US was not a racist country, said on Sunday he was hopeful a deal can be reached.

Scott, from South Carolina and the only Black Republican in the Senate, said he saw progress in talks which stalled last summer as protests raged following the killings of George Floyd and other Black Americans.

One of the reasons why Im hopeful is because my friends on the left arent looking for the issue, theyre looking for a solution, and the things that I offered last year are more popular this year, the senator told CBSs Face the Nation.

The goal isnt for Republicans or Democrats to win, but for communities to feel safer and our officers to feel respected. If we can accomplish those two major goals, the rest will be history.

The talks are intended to break an impasse over the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which passed the House in March but is frozen by the 50-50 split in the Senate.

Negotiations have taken on increasing urgency following the high-profile killings of Daunte Wright in Minneapolis and Andrew Brown in North Carolina, Black men shot in their vehicles by officers, killings which sparked outrage.

The country supports this reform and Congress should act, Biden said on Wednesday during his address on Capitol Hill.

A panel including Scott, the New Jersey Democrat Cory Booker and Karen Bass, the author of the House bill and a Democrat from California, met on Thursday to discuss key elements including individual liability for officers who abuse their power or otherwise overstep the line.

Republicans strongly oppose many of the proposals but Booker said it had been a promising week.

Scott, a rising star in Republican ranks, said he was well-placed to help steer the discussion.

One of the reasons why I asked to lead this police reform conversation on my side of the House is because I personally understand the pain of being stopped 18 times driving while Black, he said.

And I have also seen the beauty of when officers go door to door with me on Christmas morning, delivering presents to kids in the most underserved communities. So I think I bring an equilibrium to the conversation.

Scott said he was confident major sticking points in the Senate version of the proposed legislation could be overcome and the bill aligned to that which passed the House.

Think about the [parts] of the two bills that are in common data collection, he said. I think through negotiations and conversations we are closer on no-knock warrants and chokeholds, and then theres something called Section 1033 that has to do with getting government equipment from the military for local police.

I think were making progress there too, so we have literally been able to bring these two bills very close together.

The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, placed no timeline on when a revised version of the bill would get a vote.

We will bring it to the floor when we are ready, and we will be ready when we have a good, strong bipartisan bill, she said on Thursday. That is up to the Senate and then we will have it in the House, because it will be a different bill.

On the issue of whether lawsuits could be filed against police departments rather than individual officers, Chuck Schumer, the Democratic Senate majority leader, said: Were moving towards a reasonable solution.

Scott said the issue was another reason why Im more optimistic this time.

He said: We want to make sure the bad apples are punished and weve seen that, through the convictions of Michael Slager when he shot Walter Scott in the back to the George Floyd convictions.

Those are promising signs, but the real question is how do we change the culture of policing? I think we do that by making the employer responsible for the actions of the employee.

Others senators in the negotiations include Dick Durbin of Illinois and Lindsay Graham of South Carolina, senior figures in their parties.

Scott also broke with Republicans who support Donald Trumps big lie that the presidential election was rigged, saying the party could only move on once it realised the election is over, Joe Biden is the president of the United States.

On CNNs State of the Union, Susan Collins, a moderate Republican senator from Maine, appeared to acknowledge Scotts rising profile.

We are not a party that is led by just one person, she said. There are many prominent upcoming younger men and women in our party who hold great promise for leading us.

Originally posted here:

Tim Scott hopeful deal can be reached with Democrats on US policing reform - The Guardian