You know things are particularly bad when Democrats are unable to work together.
Joe Biden, who was desperately seeking to have his agenda passed through Congress by his fellow Democrats, had to personally call several of them, begging to ensure he had their vote on his side to pass the Build Back Better Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act was passed after hours of negotiations, but the progressive Democrats were unable to get the Build Back Better Act passed at the same time.
Moderate House Democrats threw a spanner in the works for their more radical counterparts, as they refused to pass the Build Back Better Act until the Congressional Budget Office had a chance to analyze the fiscal effects of the tax and spending policies within the bill. This could take several weeks to do.
While the House passed the procedural vote on Friday for the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, they were unable to pass the final bill, and the Build Back Better Act looks like it may face quite a few delays as Congress breaks for a week-long recess. And with more time away due for Thanksgiving, Biden may not get to sign his agenda into law until next year.
The procedural vote looked like it was not going to pass at all, despite Democrats holding the majority in both the House and Senate, as progressives and moderate Democrats were locking heads until Biden himself had to intervene and work out a deal between the two groups that they were both willing to accept, with the report from the CBO being one of those conditions.
Democratic Reps. Ed Case (Hawaii), Josh Gottheimer (New Jersey), Stephanie Murphy (Florida) and Kurt Schrader (Oregon) wrote:
“We commit to voting for the Build Back Better Act, in its current form other than technical changes, as expeditiously as we receive fiscal information from the Congressional Budget Office ― but in no event later than the week of November 15th.”
The bill previously sat at a cost of $3.5 trillion, but with the more vocal moderates like Joe Manchin (D-WV) not getting behind voting yes, the bill was significantly pared down in an attempt to push through a slightly less bloated budget.
The considerably less $1.75 trillion is the key to Biden’s agenda, and the promise to “Build Back Better” includes a $500 billion budget to “fight climate change” and move America towards renewable energy.
This is something that proved to have disastrous results in Texas last year during an uncommonly cold winter blast that saw millions of Texans without electricity after wind turbines and solar power (“renewable energy”) failed to work in the snow.
After the procedural vote won, in a statement, Biden said, “the Build Back Better Act will be a once-in-a-generation Investment in our people.”
The moderates were met with hostility by socialists Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Bernie Sanders (D-VT), who criticized the moderate Democrats wanting to see the CBO score for the Build Back Better Act, but not the CBO score for the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that they passed.
AOC was one of the six progressives that voted against approving the bill.
Progressives had already delayed the bill for months in an attempt to force moderate Democrats to back their more radical social safety and climate bills.
Now we have even more tension within their party.
You gotta love it when Democrats eat each other.
