Karen Erickson: In the end, Biden became the builder of bridges

On one point, the right and left have agreed during the contentious negotiations in the US Congress in recent months: They have tried to marginalize the center on every side.

While Republicans like to talk about how President Joe Biden is in the hands of “socialists” in Congress, the Progressive Brigades of Democrats have stated that disagreements within the party are due to the presence of too few conservative politicians in the party.

looked close It is impossible for President Joe Biden to make good on his campaign promises by reaching out to political opponents in a deeply polarized United States. The massive infrastructure package hammered out in the Senate in August was an exception. 19 Republicans supported the deal. Minority leader Mitch McConnell was one of them.

The package was then banned in the House of Representatives, the second chamber of Congress. Left Battalion members refused to say yes to investments in bridges and broadband — in what is sometimes called Biden’s hard package — without guarantees that everyone in the party would support the soft package, with massive investments in climate and well-being. But Democratic Senators Joe Manchin and Kirsten Senema have struggled.

For months, the White House and the Democratic leadership of Congress have been at the forefront of trying to lift the blockade.

The dispute may have been settled On the other side of the Potomac River through the night through Wednesday. republican Glenn Yongkin came home with victory in Virginia’s gubernatorial election, adjacent to Washington, DC. He reached out to key center-right voters with promises of investment in school and jobs. Democrat Terry McAuliffe had planned to use Biden’s infrastructure investments in his campaign, but had to wait in vain for a House decision.

There is much to suggest that Tuesday’s state election has also been affected by Biden’s waning support in the polls. In New Jersey, the current Democrat Governor Philip Murphy renewed his state with an emergency call, after counting the votes was much smoother than expected.

Biden won the presidential elections in both states by a large margin a year ago.

Something went wrong Crooked. Something must be done. The brigades in the Democrats agree on that. And create impetus for the leadership of the party.

But the left claims the party needs to deliver on its election promises to fight global warming, expand health insurance and support American families. Instead, he’s calling for more conservative Democratic members of Congress to think. Abigail Spanberger, a Virginia congressman, is one of them. In an interview with The New York Times on Wednesday, she claimed that President Joe Biden received a somewhat limited mandate from voters.

– She said they chose it so that it would be normal and stop the chaos.

On Friday morning, she and a handful of center-right Democrats called on the Congressional Budget Office to review the climate and welfare package. Once again, hopes for quick decisions were dashed.

For the most part By Friday, the Democrats looked more like a wreck than a party.

Finally, the message came that the Progressive Battalion was ready to let the infrastructure package pass, if internal opponents came with written guarantees in support of the eventual Climate and Welfare package.

Six apparent left-wing figures, led by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, refused to agree to the deal. The Democrats could only lose three votes. The rescue was backed by thirteen Republicans, led by well-known Trump critics such as Adam Kinzinger and Anthony Gonzalez.

The infrastructure package was adopted by votes 228-206 and is a success in its own right.

Negotiations on The important welfare package continues. The crisis of confidence in the president is not over yet. It remains to be seen whether investments in broadband and bridges will pay off in public opinion. 2022 is the midterm elections for Congress and it could be tough for the ruling party in the White House.

But Joe Biden is clearly making an impression as president. And he has already managed to do so at the shrinking center of American politics. For a moment, he became the builder of bridges.