President Joe Biden
Biden says Russian invasion in Feb. ‘distinct possibility’
The White House says President Joe Biden warned Ukraine’s president Thursday that there is a “distinct possibility” Russia could take military action against Ukraine in February. The Kremlin likewise sounded a grim note, saying it saw “little ground for optimism” in resolving the crisis after the U.S. this week again rejected Russia’s main demands.
Russian officials said dialogue was still possible to end the crisis, but Biden again offered a stark warning amid growing concerns that Russian President Vladimir Putin will give the go-ahead for a further invasion of Ukrainian territory in the not-so-distant future.
The White House said Biden’s comments to Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a phone call amplified concerns that administration officials have been making for some time.
“President Biden said that there is a distinct possibility that the Russians could invade Ukraine in February,” White House National Security Council spokesperson Emily Horne said. “He has said this publicly and we have been warning about this for months. ”
Tensions have soared in recent weeks, as the United States and its NATO allies expressed concern that a buildup of about 100,000 Russian troops near Ukraine signaled that Moscow planned to invade its ex-Soviet neighbor. Russia denies having any such designs — and has laid out a series of demands it says will improve security in Europe.
Also read: US offers no concessions in response to Russia on Ukraine
But as expected, the U.S. and the Western alliance firmly rejected any concessions on Moscow’s main points Wednesday, refusing to permanently ban Ukraine from joining NATO and saying allied deployments of troops and military equipment in Eastern Europe are nonnegotiable.
The U.S. did outline areas in which some of Russia’s concerns might be addressed, possibly offering a path to de-escalation. But, as it has done repeatedly for the past several weeks, Washington also warned Moscow of devastating sanctions if it invades Ukraine. In addition to penalties targeting Russian people and key economic sectors, several senior U.S. officials said Thursday with certainty that Germany would not allow a newly constructed gas pipeline to begin operations in the event of an incursion.
All eyes are now on Putin, who will decide how Russia will respond amid fears that Europe could again be plunged into war.
In the meantime, Biden spoke to his Ukrainian counterpart Zelenskyy on Thursday to reiterate American and allied support, including recent deliveries of U.S. military aid.
Biden warned Zelenskyy that the U.S. believed there was a high degree of likelihood that Russia could invade when the ground freezes and Russian forces could attack Ukrainian territory from north of Kyiv, according to two people familiar with the conversation who were not authorized to comment publicly.
Military experts have said Russia may be waiting for optimal ground conditions to move heavy equipment into Kyiv as part of any invasion. Eight years ago, Russia invaded Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in late February.
Also read: Russia sees little optimism in US response on Ukraine crisis
Zelenskyy tweeted that he and Biden also discussed the possibility of additional financial support for Ukraine.
The White House said Biden told Zelenskyy he was “exploring additional macroeconomic support to help Ukraine’s economy” as it comes under pressure as a result of Russia’s military buildup.
Meanwhile, the United States announced that the U.N. Security Council will hold an open meeting Monday on what U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield called Russia’s “threatening behavior.” She said the deployment of more than 100,000 troops along Ukraine’s border and other destabilizing acts pose “a clear threat to international peace and security and the U.N. Charter.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters earlier that the response from the U.S. — and a similar one from NATO — left “little ground for optimism.” But he added that “there always are prospects for continuing a dialogue, it’s in the interests of both us and the Americans.”
White House press secretary Jen Psaki was circumspect when asked whether the Biden administration saw a sliver of hope in that the Russians said they would keep communications open even as they said that they lacked optimism..
“We don’t know if the Russians are playing games on diplomacy. We hope not,” Psaki said.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said the U.S. response contained some elements that could lead to “the start of a serious talk on secondary issues,” but emphasized that “the document contains no positive response on the main issue.” Those are Moscow’s demands that NATO not expand and that the alliance refrain from deploying weapons that might threaten Russia.
Lavrov said top officials will submit proposals to Putin. Peskov said the Russian reaction would come soon.
The evasive official comments reflect the fact that it is Putin who will single-handedly determine Russia’s next moves. He has warned of unspecified “military-technical measures” if the West refuses to heed the demands.
Peskov added that Putin and Biden will decide whether they need to have another conversation following two calls last month.
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Kyiv had seen the U.S. response before it was delivered to Russia and had no objections. He tweeted it was “important that the U.S. remains in close contact with Ukraine before and after all contacts with Russia.”
On a visit to Denmark, Kuleba emphasized his country’s need to strengthen its defenses.
“This crisis is a moment of truth, and this is why we speak about weapons,” he said. “This is why we speak about economic sanctions. This is why we speak about the consolidated position of all of us, so that President Putin sees that there are no weak links in our defensive chain.”
Germany’s Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said during a parliamentary debate on Ukraine that her government is closely coordinating its policy with allies, considering a range of options that could include the new Nord Stream 2 Russian gas pipeline to Germany.
While the diplomacy sputters on, so too do maneuvers that have escalated tensions. Russia has launched a series of military drills involving motorized infantry and artillery units in southwestern Russia, warplanes in Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea, dozens of warships in the Black Sea and the Arctic, and Russian fighter jets and paratroopers in Belarus.
NATO said it was bolstering its deterrence in the Baltic Sea region, and the U.S. ordered 8,500 troops on higher alert for potential deployment to Europe.
As war fears mounted, thousands of Ukrainians expressed their resolve to stand up to the Russian pressure under the hashtag #UkrainiansWillResist on Twitter and Facebook.
“No one will force Ukrainians to accept the Kremlin ultimatum,” wrote Andrii Levus, who initiated the campaign.
Ukraine’s Interior Ministry has organized training on acting in emergency situations, with an emphasis on dealing with explosives.
Beyond concerns about a possible Russian offensive in Ukraine, there also has been speculation that Moscow’s response could include military deployments to the Western Hemisphere.
While a senior Russian diplomat recently refused to rule out such deployments to Cuba and Venezuela, a top Putin associate expressed skepticism Thursday at that prospect.
“Cuba and Venezuela are aiming to come out of isolation and restore normal relations with the U.S. to a certain extent, so there can’t be any talk about setting up a base there as happened during the Soviet times,” Dmitry Medvedev, a deputy head of Russia’s Security Council, told Russian media.
While he charged that the West is using Ukraine as a way to contain Russia, he somberly acknowledged that a Russia-NATO conflict “would be the most dramatic and simply catastrophic scenario, and I hope it will never happen.”
While concerns about a possible Russian attack linger, a separatist conflict simmers in Ukraine. Following the 2014 ouster of a Kremlin-friendly president in Kyiv, Moscow annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula and backed an insurgency in the country’s eastern industrial heartland. Fighting between Ukrainian forces and Russia-backed rebels has killed over 14,000 people, and efforts to reach a settlement have stalled.
Since the conflict began, Russia has been accused of sending troops and weapons to the separatists, something it has denied. On Thursday, Peskov wouldn’t comment on a proposal from the Kremlin’s main political party, United Russia, which suggested that Moscow respond to the delivery of Western weapons to Ukraine by sending arms to the rebels. He added that Putin is aware of the proposal but had no immediate reaction.
At least 3 judges eyed as Biden mulls Supreme Court pick
President Joe Biden is eyeing at least three judges for an expected vacancy on the Supreme Court as he prepares to quickly deliver on his campaign pledge to nominate the first Black woman to the nation’s highest court, according to aides and allies.
Biden and Justice Stephen Breyer are expected to hold an event at the White House Thursday to formally announce Breyer’s plans to retire, according to a person briefed on the planning who was not authorized to publicly discuss it in advance.
Early discussions about a successor are focusing on U.S. Circuit Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, U.S. District Judge J. Michelle Childs and California Supreme Court Justice Leondra Kruger, according to four people familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss White House deliberations. Jackson and Kruger have long been seen as possible nominees.
Since Biden took office in January 2021, he has focused on nominating a diverse group of judges to the federal bench, installing five Black women on federal appeals courts, with three more nominations pending before the Senate. Other possible candidates for the high court could come from among that group, Biden aides and allies said, especially since almost all of the recent Supreme Court nominees have been federal appeals judges.
Read:Justice Breyer to retire, giving Biden first court pick
“He has a strong pool to select a candidate from, in addition to other sources. This is an historic opportunity to appoint someone with a strong record on civil and human rights,” said Derrick Johnson, the NAACP’s president.
By the end of his first year, Biden had won confirmation of 40 judges, the most since President Ronald Reagan. Of those, 80% are women and 53% are people of color, according to the White House.
Jackson, 51, was nominated by President Barack Obama to be a district court judge. Biden elevated her to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Early in her career, she was also a law clerk for Breyer.
Childs, a federal judge in South Carolina, has been nominated but not yet confirmed to serve on the same circuit court. Her name has surfaced partly because she is a favorite among some high-profile lawmakers, including Rep. James Clyburn, D-S.C.
Kruger, a graduate of Harvard and Yale’s law school, was previously a Supreme Court clerk and has argued a dozen cases before the justices as a lawyer for the federal government.
Breyer, 83, will retire at the end of the summer, according to two sources who confirmed the news to The Associated Press on Wednesday. They spoke on condition of anonymity so as not to preempt Breyer’s formal announcement.
But the Senate can confirm a successor before there is a formal vacancy, so the White House was getting to work and it was expected to take at least a few weeks before a nomination was formalized.
Biden said Wednesday he wasn’t going to get ahead of Breyer’s announcement.
“Every justice should have an opportunity to decide what he or she is going to do and announce it on their own,” Biden said. “Let him make whatever statement he’s going to make and I’ll be happy to talk about it later.”
When Biden was running for the White House, he said that if he had the chance to nominate someone to the court, he would make history by choosing a Black woman. And he’s reiterated that pledge since.
“As president, I’d be honored, honored to appoint the first African American woman. Because it should look like the country. It’s long past time,” Biden said in February 2020 shortly before South Carolina’s presidential primary.
Adding a Black woman to the court would mean a series of firsts — four female justices and two Black justices serving at the same time on the nine-member court. Justice Clarence Thomas is the court’s only Black justice and just the second ever, after Thurgood Marshall.
And Biden would have the chance to show Black voters increasingly frustrated with a president they helped to elect that he is serious about their concerns, particularly after he has been unable to push through voting rights legislation.
At the same time, Breyer’s replacement by another liberal justice would not change the ideological makeup of the court. Conservatives outnumber liberals by 6-3, and Donald Trump’s three nominees made an already conservative court even more conservative.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Biden’s nominee “will receive a prompt hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee and will be considered and confirmed by the full United States Senate with all deliberate speed.”
But Republicans in particular remain upset about Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s contentious 2018 hearing. Still, Democrats have the 50 votes plus a tiebreaker in Vice President Kamala Harris that they need to confirm a nominee.
Read: Supreme Court halts Biden’s COVID-19 vaccine rule for US businesses
Republicans who changed the Senate rules during the Trump-era to allow simple majority confirmation of Supreme Court nominees appeared resigned to the outcome. Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, an influential Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in a statement, “If all Democrats hang together — which I expect they will — they have the power to replace Justice Breyer in 2022 without one Republican vote in support.”
Nonetheless, Democrats have also been unable to get all their members on board for Biden’s social and environmental spending agenda or to move forward with a voting rights bill.
As a senator, Biden served as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, overseeing six Supreme Court confirmation hearings from 1987 to 1995, including Breyer’s.
And one person who will be central to Biden’s process is chief of staff Ron Klain, a former Supreme Court law clerk and chief counsel to that committee.
Two other Black women whom Biden appointed to federal appeals courts are also seen as contenders: Holly Thomas, a longtime civil rights lawyer he named to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, and Candace Jackson-Akiwumi, a former public defender he named to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit.
Biden could also choose someone from outside the judiciary, though that seems less likely. One contender would be the head of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Sherrilyn Ifill, 59. She has headed the fund since 2013 and has announced she is stepping down in the spring.
The Supreme Court has had three women on it for more than a decade, since 2010, when Obama named Justice Elena Kagan to the court to replace the retiring John Paul Stevens. Kagan joined Obama’s other nominee, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the court’s first Latina justice, and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. When Ginsburg died in September 2020, Trump announced his choice of Amy Coney Barrett eight days later.
Biden says nation weary from COVID but rising with him in WH
President Joe Biden acknowledged Wednesday that the pandemic has left Americans exhausted and demoralized but insisted at a news conference marking his first year in office that he has “outperformed” expectations in dealing with it.
Facing sagging poll numbers and a stalled legislative agenda, Biden conceded he would likely have to pare back his “build back better” recovery package and instead settle for “big chunks” of his signature economic plan. He promised to further attack inflation and the pandemic and blamed Republicans for uniting in opposition to his proposals rather than offering ideas of their own.
This is a perilous time for Biden: The nation is gripped by a disruptive new surge of virus cases, and inflation is at a level not seen in a generation. Democrats are bracing for a potential midterm rout if he can’t turn things around.
Biden insisted that voters will come to embrace a more positive view of his tenure — and of his beleaguered party — in time. His appeal to voters for patience came with a pledge to spend more time outside Washington to make the case to them directly.
Biden also addressed the brewing crisis on the Ukraine border, where Russia has massed some 100,000 troops and raised concerns that Moscow is ready to launch a further invasion.
The president said his “guess” is Russia may move further but he believes President Vladimir Putin doesn’t want full-blown war. He declared Russia would pay a “dear price” if Putin launches a military incursion.
“He has to do something,” Biden said of Putin. “He is trying to find his place in the world between China and the West.”
Biden suggested a “minor incursion” might elicit a lesser response than a full-scale invasion of the country, a comment that drew immediate condemnation from some corners.
“President Biden basically gave Putin a green light to invade Ukraine by yammering about the supposed insignificance of a ‘minor incursion,’” said Republican Sen. Ben Sasse.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki indicated in a subsequent statement that that wasn’t necessarily about tanks and troops.
“President Biden also knows from long experience that the Russians have an extensive playbook of aggression short of military action, including cyberattacks and paramilitary tactics. And he affirmed today that those acts of Russian aggression will be met with a decisive, reciprocal, and united response,” she said.
Biden held forth for 1 hour and 50 minutes in the East Room of the White House, appearing to relish the opportunity to parry questions from two dozen journalists with doses of wit and a few flashes of anger. At several points, he looked at his watch, smiled and kept calling on reporters.
He fielded questions about inflation, nuclear talks with Iran, voting rights, political division, Vice President Kamala Harris’ place on the 2024 ticket, trade with China and the competency of government. Those questions showed the multitude of challenges confronting the president, each of them as much a risk as an opportunity to prove himself.
Read:Biden signs $768.2 billion defense spending bill into law
The president began by reeling off early progress in fighting the virus and showcasing quick passage of an ambitious bipartisan roads-and-bridges infrastructure deal. But his economic, voting rights, police reform and immigration agenda have all been thwarted in a barely Democratic-controlled Senate, while inflation has emerged as an economic threat to the nation and a political risk for Biden.
Despite his faltering approval numbers, Biden claimed to have “probably outperformed what anybody thought would happen” in a country still coping with the coronavirus.
“After almost two years of physical, emotional and psychological impact of this pandemic, for many of us, it’s been too much to bear,” Biden said.
“Some people may call what’s happening now ’the new normal,″ he added, his voice rising. “I call it a job not yet finished. It will get better.”
On his nearly $2 trillion economic agenda that West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin has blocked from moving forward, Biden said he’ll pass the parts of the package that can net sufficient votes. This likely means not extending the expanded child tax credit or providing financial support to community colleges, Biden said.
“I think we can break the package up, get as much as we can now, come back and fight for the rest,” he said, later adding that he would apply the same strategy to his voting reform agenda.
The social spending bill was once viewed as a catch-all home for various progressive priorities, but now Democrats are sensing a need to deliver a solid accomplishment to voters in the midterm year and are beginning to come to terms with a slimmed-down package that can overcome Manchin’s reticence.
The White House and congressional Democratic leaders are expected to refocus their attention on it beginning next week, after the all-but-certain collapse of the Democrats’ push on voting rights legislation. Talks to craft a new bill that meets Manchin’s demands and can garner the virtually unanimous Democratic support needed to pass Congress will likely take weeks.
The Democrats’ goal is to have a package — or be on the cusp of one — that Biden can highlight in his March 1 State of the Union address.
If Biden seemed to have one set of regrets so far, it was his inability because of the coronavirus to connect with more Americans outside the capital. He noted that this challenge was most acutely felt by Black voters who wanted him to push more aggressively on expanding access to voting.
“I don’t get a chance to look people in the eye because of both COVID and things that are happening in Washington,” he said.
Speaking as Democrats were mounting a doomed effort to change Senate rules to pass the voting measure, Biden said he still hoped that it would pass in some form and wasn’t prepared yet to discuss possible executive actions on the issue. The vote spotlighted the constraints on Biden’s influence barely a week after he delivered an impassioned speech in Atlanta suggesting opponents of the measures were taking a historical stance alongside segregationists and exhorting senators to action.
Read: Biden tries COVID cajoling, avoids new decrees that divide
Still, he said he understood that civil rights groups were anxious and frustrated about the lack of action, particularly Black voters who question why he didn’t press the issue harder and earlier.
There are at least 19 Republican-backed laws in states that make it harder to vote, and Jan. 6 insurrection supporters are filling local election posts and running for office.
It was Biden’s seventh solo news conference as president. The ongoing threat from the coronavirus was evident in the setup of Wednesday’s gathering: A limited number of reporters were allowed to attend and all had to have been tested for the virus and wear masks.
The president used the event to pay heed to growing anxiety about rising prices. Staring down an inflation rate that has gone from 1.7% at his inauguration to 7%, he called on the Federal Reserve to lessen its monetary boosting of the economy by raising interest rates, which would in theory help to reduce inflation.
“Given the strength of our economy, and the pace of recent price increases, it’s important to recalibrate the support that is now necessary,” Biden said. “Now, we need to get inflation under control.”
Despite it all, Biden said he’s convinced the country is still with him — even if they don’t tell that to pollsters.
“I don’t believe the polls,” he said.
Biden urges concern but not alarm in US as omicron rises
President Joe Biden urged concern but not alarm Tuesday as the United States set records for daily reported COVID-19 cases and his administration struggled to ease concerns about testing shortages, school closures and other disruptions caused by the omicron variant.
In remarks before a meeting with his COVID-19 response team at the White House, Biden aimed to convey his administration’s urgency in addressing omicron and convince wary Americans that the current situation bears little resemblance to the onset of the pandemic or last year’s deadly winter. The president emphasized that vaccines, booster shots and therapeutic drugs have lessened the danger for the overwhelming majority of Americans who are fully vaccinated.
“You can still get COVID, but it’s highly unlikely, very unlikely, that you’ll become seriously ill,” Biden said of vaccinated people.
“There’s no excuse, there’s no excuse for anyone being unvaccinated,” he added. “This continues to be a pandemic of the unvaccinated.” He also encouraged Americans, including newly eligible teenagers 12 to 15, to get a booster dose of the vaccines for maximum protection.
Compared with last year, more Americans are employed, most kids are in classrooms, and instances of death and serious illness are down — precipitously so among the vaccinated.
“We’re in a very different place than we were a year ago,” said White House press secretary Jen Psaki when asked if the country had lost control of the virus.
Still, over the past several weeks Americans have seen dire warnings about hospitals reaching capacity amid staffing shortages, thousands of holiday flight cancellations in part because crews were ill or in quarantine, and intermittent reports of school closures because of the more-transmissible variant.
On a conference call with governors, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Biden’s top COVID-19 science adviser, said Americans “should not be complacent” even though initial data shows the omicron variant to produce less severe disease than earlier strains. But, he said, the number of people getting infected by omicron “might overwhelm the positive impact of reduced severity” and “severely stress our hospitals”
While most schools across the country remain open, Biden took aim at those that have closed, saying he believes they have the money for testing and other safety measures. “I believe schools should remain open,” he said.
The president also announced that the U.S. is doubling its order for an anti-viral pill produced by Pfizer that was recently authorized by the FDA to prevent serious illness and death from COVID-19. That means 20 million doses, with the first 10 million pills to be delivered by June.
A senior administration official said that combined with other therapies, such as monoclonal antibodies and convalescent plasma, 4 million treatments that are effective against the omicron variant would be available by the end of January.
The pills are “a game changer and have the potential to dramatically alter the impact of COVID-19, the impact it’s had on this country and our people,” Biden said.
Biden is under pressure to ease a nationwide shortages of tests that people are using to determine whether they or their family members are infected. Long lines and chaotic scenes over the holidays marred the administration’s image as having the pandemic in hand.
Read:Biden to urge Americans to get vaccinated as Christmas nears
“On testing, I know this remains frustrating. Believe me it’s frustrating to me, but we’re making improvements,” Biden said.
In a reversal, the White House announced last month that it would make 500 million rapid antigen tests available free to requesting Americans, but it will be weeks, if not months, before those tests are widely available. The administration notes those tests are on top of existing supply of rapid tests and that even a small increase will help ease some of the shortages. Additionally, private insurers will be required to cover the cost of at-home tests starting later this month.
Test manufacturers have until Tuesday night to respond to the government’s contract request, and the first awards are expected to be made this week, Psaki said. The administration is still developing a system for Americans to order the tests as well as a means to ship them to people’s homes.
Pressed when the first tests would reach Americans, Psaki said, “I don’t have an update on that at this point in time.”
Also read: Biden tries COVID cajoling, avoids new decrees that divide
In a letter Monday, GOP Sens. Richard Burr and Roy Blunt, the top Republicans on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee and a Senate Appropriations subcommittee on health, respectively, pressed the Department of Health and Human Services for answers on how the administration was working to address nationwide testing shortages.
“With over $82.6 billion specifically appropriated for testing, and flexibility within the department to allocate additional funds from COVID-19 supplemental bills or annual appropriations if necessary, it is unclear to us why we are facing such dire circumstances now,” they wrote. “It does not appear to be because of lack of funding, but a more fundamental lack of strategy and a failure to anticipate future testing needs by the administration.”
White House officials have noted that the spike in testing demand is driven not just by omicron, but by people seeking to travel safely during the holidays and return to school after, and that the shortages are global in nature.
“Turns out, Omicron is driving a spike in demand for testing...everywhere,” tweeted Ben Wakana, the deputy director of strategic communications & engagement for the White House’s COVID-19 response team, highlighting similar shortages in the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia.
Biden undergoes routine colonoscopy, Harris briefly in power
President Joe Biden briefly transferred power to Vice President Kamala Harris on Friday to undergo a routine colonoscopy at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center before resuming his duties, the White House said.
Biden drove early Friday to the medical center in the Washington suburbs for his first routine physical exam as president. Press secretary Jen Psaki said Biden would be under anesthesia during the colonoscopy and temporarily transferred power to Harris. Psaki said Biden resumed his duties after speaking with Harris and White House chief of staff Ron Klain at approximately 11:35 a.m.
Harris, the first woman, person of color and person of South Asian descent to be vice president, made history during the short time she served as acting president. She was scheduled to travel to Ohio later Friday, after Biden resumed his duties.
Read:Biden and Xi meet virtually as US-China chasm widens
“As was the case when President George W. Bush had the same procedure in 2002 and 2007, and following the process set out in the Constitution, President Biden will transfer power to the Vice President for the brief period of time when he is under anesthesia,” Psaki said before Biden’s colonoscopy. “The Vice President will work from her office in the West Wing during this time.”
Biden, 78, had his last full exam in December 2019, when doctors found the former vice president to be “healthy, vigorous” and “fit to successfully execute the duties of the Presidency,” according to a doctor’s report at the time. Biden, who turns 79 on Saturday, is the oldest person to serve as president, and interest in his health has been high since he declared his candidacy for the White House in 2019.
Dr. Kevin O’Connor, who has been Biden’s primary care physician since 2009, wrote in a three-page note that the then-presidential candidate was in overall good shape.
In that report, O’Connor said that since 2003, Biden has had episodes of atrial fibrillation, a type of irregular heartbeat that’s potentially serious but treatable. At the time, O’Connor cited a list of tests that showed Biden’s heart was functioning normally and his only needed care was a blood thinner to prevent the most worrisome risk, blood clots or stroke.
Biden had a brush with death in 1988, requiring surgery to repair two brain aneurysms, weak bulges in arteries, one of them leaking. Biden has never had a recurrence, his doctor said, citing a test in 2014 that examined his arteries.
Read:Virginia governor race emerges as test of Biden popularity
Pursuant to the 25th Amendment to the Constitution, Biden signed letters to Sen. Patrick Leahy, who’s president pro tempore of the Senate, and to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at 10:10 a.m., saying he would be unable to discharge his duties while under anesthesia, making Harris the acting president. Biden sent them each another letter upon the conclusion of the procedure to resume his duties.
On Friday afternoon, Biden is scheduled to take part in the annual pardoning of the national Thanksgiving turkey.
When Biden took office he brought O’Connor back to the White House to continue serving as his doctor, and O’Connor was expected to lead a team of experts in conducting Biden’s physical exam Friday.
Once the COVID-19 pandemic emerged in early 2020, Biden’s team took intense steps to keep the then-candidate and now-president healthy as the virus raged and took a disproportionate toll among older populations. Biden received his first dose of the COVID-19 vaccines in December 2020 and his second dose just two weeks before taking office. He received a booster dose, which regulators say provides more enduring protection, in late September.
The White House said Biden would authorize the release of a medical report, as is customary for presidents and presidential candidates. Former President Donald Trump, 75, was sharply criticized for releasing only cursory details on his health while running and serving in the White House, including concealing the seriousness of his COVID-19 illness a month before the 2020 presidential election.
Biden winds up G-20 summit with dings at Russia, China
President Joe Biden wrapped up his time at the Group of 20 summit on Sunday trying to convince Americans and the wider world that he’s got things under control — and taking Russia, China and Saudi Arabia to task for not doing enough to deal with the existential threat of climate change.
Biden’s overall take on his efforts: On climate change, he’s got $900 billion planned for renewable energy, and Congress will vote this coming week. On supply chains, he has plans to make the ports run better and tamp down inflation. For workers, he’s building an economy with pay raises. On diplomacy, world leaders trust him.
But he also acknowledged what he can’t yet achieve: bringing Russia, China and Saudi Arabia to the table with the broader international community to limit carbon emissions and move to renewable energy.
In a news conference Sunday, the U.S. president spelled out his belief that all politics is personal and that what progress was achieved at the Rome summit came from direct interactions with other leaders.
Read:PM Hasina off to Europe to join COP26, other events
“They know me. I know them,” Biden said of his fellow G-20 leaders. “We get things done together.”
“We’ve made significant progress and more has to be done,” Biden added. “But it’s going to require us to continue to focus on what Russia’s not doing, what China’s not doing, what Saudi Arabia’s not doing.”
For all the challenges confronting him, the president attempted to stay optimistic. As Biden departed the news conference, he offered a thumbs up when asked if West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin and Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema — key Democratic votes — were on board with his $1.75 trillion spending package for families, health care and renewable energy. The president also shrugged off his recent decline in the polls, saying that numbers go up and down.
As for the potential significance of Biden’s thumbs-up on congressional negotiations, White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, said, “As the President said during the press conference, he is confident we are going to get this done and the thumbs up was simply a visual restatement of that.”
Read: PM’s France visit to elevate Dhaka-Paris ties: FM
But the policy issues also seemed to fade for Biden when asked about his time Friday with Pope Francis. The president became deeply emotional, his hands appearing to fiddle with the mask he wore as a precaution because of COVID-19. He spoke of how the pope comforted the Biden family in a Philadelphia airport hangar after the death of his son, Beau, in 2015.
“When I won, (Pope Francis) called me to tell me how much he appreciated the fact that I would focus on the poor. focus on the needs of people who are in trouble,” Biden said. “He is everything I learned about Catholicism from the time I was a kid going from grade school to high school.”
The president did leave the G-20 with commitments by his fellow leaders on a global minimum tax that would make it harder for large companies to avoid taxes by assigning their profits to countries with low tax rates. He announced new funding to improve ports and shipping, in addition to a conference next year on supply chains. He patched up differences with the European Union on tariffs and differences with France on the sale of a nuclear-powered submarines to Australia.
The president met Sunday with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose office said the meeting was held in a “positive atmosphere” despite tensions over human rights and Turkey’s purchase of a Russian missile system, among other issues.
Biden heads Monday to the U.N. climate summit in Scotland, where he’ll once again face questions about whether the world’s wealthiest are doing enough to stop the warming of the Earth by moving away from fossil fuels. The president on Sunday dismissed the contradiction that he’s fighting for climate change while also asking oil-rich countries to increase their production in order to lower gasoline prices for U.S. commuters.
“The idea that we’re not going to need gasoline for automobiles is just not realistic,” Biden said. “It has a profound impact on working-class families, just to get back and forth to work. So I don’t see anything inconsistent with that.”
Defiant Biden is face of chaotic Afghan evacuation
Four presidents share responsibility for the missteps in Afghanistan that accumulated over two decades. But only President Joe Biden will be the face of the war’s chaotic, violent conclusion.
The president fought that reality Monday as he spread blame for the Taliban’s swift and complete recapture of Afghanistan. He pointed to a previous agreement brokered by then-President Donald Trump, expressed frustration with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and lamented the performance of Afghan national security forces. Republicans overwhelmingly criticized Biden and he found few vocal backers among fellow Democrats.
Read: Chaos as thousands flee Afghanistan after Taliban takeover
The collapse of the Afghan government is the biggest foreign policy crisis of Biden’s young presidency, recalling setbacks for past presidents such as the withdrawal from Vietnam and the botched Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba. The reverberations of the Taliban’s success were startling, endangering Afghan women and girls, posing new security threats and threatening to undercut global views of America’s reliability.
In the face of such stark consequences, Biden admitted no fault for the chaotic drawdown and instead forcefully defended his move to leave a nation the U.S. has tried to safeguard since it toppled the Taliban regime after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, when smoke still rose from the rubble of the World Trade Center.
“Here’s what I believe to my core: It is wrong to order American troops to step up when Afghanistan’s own armed forces would not,” said Biden. “How many more generations of America’s daughters and sons would you have me send to fight Afghanistan’s civil war? I will not repeat the mistakes we made in the past.”
Read: Biden team surprised by rapid Taliban gains in Afghanistan
When Biden took responsibility, it was more for ending the war than for the manner in which it happened.
“I know my decision will be criticized. But I would rather take that criticism than pass this on to a fifth president,” said Biden. “I am the president of the United States, the buck stops with me.”
His firm tone differed little from just five weeks ago, when he bullishly predicted what would happen as his August 31 deadline for withdrawal neared. He declared there was going to be no repeat of the humiliating U.S. evacuation from Vietnam nearly a half century ago and “no circumstance where you see people being lifted off the roof of an embassy of the United States from Afghanistan.”
But Monday yielded devastating images from Kabul that rivaled anything witnessed in Saigon.
Thousands of Afghan citizens, many of whom worked as translators and other aides to American troops, thronged the Kabul airport, desperate to escape the Taliban. In heartbreaking footage, some tried to desperately board a U.S. military plane flying to safety, attempting to dash alongside as it raced down the runway.
A few managed to cling to the plane before it took off and video showed several falling through the air as the airplane rapidly gained altitude over the city.
The evacuation received condemnation at home and abroad, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel calling the latest developments “bitter, dramatic and awful.” And security officials warned that Afghanistan would soon provide safe harbor for terrorist groups again.
The Taliban seemed poised to have total of control of Afghanistan on Sept. 11, just as they did on the date two decades earlier when al-Qaida terror attacks plotted from its soil toppled the World Trade Center and damaged the Pentagon. The fallout from 2001 attacks reshaped America’s relationship with the Middle East, and more than 3,000 American and NATO forces died in the resulting combat in Afghanistan during the manhunt for Osama bin Laden and beyond.
Under the command of President George W. Bush, American forces stormed into Afghanistan soon after the terror attacks on a hunt for bin Laden while trying to disrupt al-Qaida’s ability to conduct further assaults on the West. There was immediate success: The Taliban were routed, the terror group disrupted.
But after that came the grinding second phase of the war and a surge of troops from President Barack Obama in 2009. Though Obama later moved to reduce the number of troops, the volume of insurgent attacks and civilian causalities prevented a full drawdown.
Trump mulled meeting the Taliban at Camp David on an earlier Sept. 11 anniversary, only to back away from the idea amid an uproar. But he announced that the U.S. would pull all its forces out by May 2021, an agreement Biden honored and delayed only slightly.
Efforts were made, at great expense, across all the administrations to train and arm the Afghan forces once the U.S. departed. But that investment of American blood, time and treasure proved useless as the Taliban conquered much of the nation without a fight and Afghanistan’s president fled the country as soon as the invading forces reached Kabul.
Read: Who are the Taliban?
In the upper ranks of Biden’s staff, the rapid collapse in Afghanistan only confirmed the decision to leave: If the meltdown of the Afghan forces would come so quickly after nearly two decades of American presence, another six months or a year or two or more would not have changed anything.
His move to withdraw troops this summer, though polarizing in the national security community, had been praised by some on both sides of the aisle as timely and appropriate. But on Monday, Republicans were eager to slam Biden’s decision and blame him for the chaos, though many of them had supported a withdrawal when it had been proposed by Trump a year ago.
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, however, had consistently advocated keeping troops in Afghanistan, and he said the military briefings he attended suggested the Taliban would be able to quickly regain power.
“I think the president felt strongly about this, obviously,” McConnell said. “He overruled his own military leaders to do it and he owns it.”
Biden has argued for more than a decade that Afghanistan was a kind of purgatory for the United States. He found it to be corrupt, addicted to America’s largesse and an unreliable partner that should be made to fend for itself. His goal was to protect Americans from terrorist attacks, not building a country, and his aides have pointed to polling — taken before the chaos of the last week — that shows that a majority of Americans favor bringing troops home.
But that political gamble could prove risky as the scenes of fear and violence from Afghanistan are broadcast around the globe, especially if the chaos in Kabul makes “Saigon look like Disney World,” warned Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., a veteran who served in Afghanistan.
“The bottom line is that there’s going to be a lot of people that are very let down by the United States of America,” Kinzinger said in an interview. “We will inevitably, inevitably be in conflict again somewhere. How are we going to convince those locals that we’re going to follow through when we’ve abandoned those in Afghanistan?”
Biden promotes milestone of 300M vaccine shots in 150 days
President Joe Biden took a cautious victory lap Friday in his quest to bring the COVID-19 pandemic under control, announcing that 300 million vaccine shots have been administered in the 150 days since he took office.
Biden credited scientists, companies, the American people and his whole-of-government effort. The president noted that the widespread vaccination campaign had set the stage for most Americans to have a relatively normal summer as businesses reopen and employers hire.
“We’re heading into a very different summer compared to last year,” the president said. “A bright summer. Prayerfully, a summer of joy.”
But as Biden marks one milestone, he is in danger of failing to meet another: his target to have 70% of American adults at least partially vaccinated by July Fourth, in a little over two weeks.
Overall, about 168 million American adults, or 65.1% of the U.S. population 18 years and older, have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine as of Friday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The pace of new vaccinations in the U.S. has dropped significantly from a high of nearly 2 million per day about two months ago, jeopardizing Biden’s ability to hit the 70% mark.
The White House said its whole-of-government approach to the vaccination effort has put the virus in retreat, which in turn has brought COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths to their lowest levels in more than a year. But Biden noted in his remarks that some communities in states with lower vaccination rates are seeing cases and hospitalizations increase.
The administration is in the middle of a monthlong blitz to combat vaccine hesitancy and the lack of urgency some people feel to get the shots, particularly in the South and Midwest.
CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said Friday that she expects the delta variant of the coronavirus will become the dominant strain in the U.S. That strain has become dominant in Britain after it was first detected in India.
Read:Record high 82 million-plus people displaced despite Covid: UN
During an appearance on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” she told Americans who get their shots that “you’ll be protected against this delta variant.”
As part of the administration’s vaccination push, Vice President Kamala Harris traveled to Atlanta on Friday to tour a pop-up COVID-19 vaccination site at Ebenezer Baptist Church, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a pastor until his assassination in 1968. The current senior pastor is U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock.
Also read: EU takes on AstraZeneca in court over vaccine deliveries
Harris also spoke at a COVID-19 vaccination mobilization event at Clark Atlanta University, a historically Black school. She told students they “have the power to end this pandemic” by giving people information about the multitude of resources, such as free car rides and child care, that are available to help them get vaccinated.
In Fulton County, Georgia, where Atlanta is located, 49% of residents have received at least one shot. Statewide, it is 42%, Harris said.
“Getting vaccinated is about building the power of community,” she said. “Getting vaccinated is about building the power of our country.”
The Biden administration insists that even if the 70% vaccination goal is unmet, it will have little effect on the overall U.S. recovery, which is already ahead of where Biden said it would be months ago.
Biden wants to celebrate Independence Day as a “summer of freedom” from the virus.
Also read: Bangladesh approves single-dose Janssen Covid-19 vaccine
Earlier this week, the White House announced plans to host first responders, essential workers and service members and their families on the South Lawn for a cookout and to watch the fireworks over the National Mall.
More than 1,000 guests are expected for what will be one of the largest events of Biden’s presidency.
Biden opens overseas trip declaring ‘United States is back’
President Joe Biden opened the first overseas trip of his term Wednesday with a declaration that “the United States is back” as he seeks to reassert the nation on the world stage and steady European allies deeply shaken by his predecessor.
Biden has set the stakes for his eight-day trip in sweeping terms, believing the West must publicly demonstrate it can compete economically with China as the world emerges from the coronavirus pandemic. It is an open repudiation of his predecessor, Donald Trump, who scorned alliances and withdrew from a global climate change agreement that Biden has since rejoined.
The president’s first stop was a visit with U.S. troops and their families at Royal Air Force Mildenhall, where he laid out his mission for the trip.
“We’re going to make it clear that the United States is back and democracies are standing together to tackle the toughest challenges and issues that matter the most to our future,” he said. “That we’re committed to leading with strength, defending our values, and delivering for our people.”
The challenges awaiting Biden overseas were clear as the president and the audience wore masks — a reminder of the pandemic that is still raging around much of the world even as its threat recedes within the United States.
Also read: Biden to assure allies, meet Putin during 1st overseas trip
“We have to end COVID-19 not just at home -- which we’re doing -- but everywhere,” Biden said.
Shortly before the president spoke, people briefed on the matter said the Biden administration had brokered an agreement with Pfizer to purchase 500 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to be donated to 92 lower-income countries and the African Union over the next year.
National security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters that Biden was committed to sharing vaccines because it was in the public health and strategic interests of the U.S. He added that Biden is aiming to show “that democracies are the countries that can best deliver solutions for people everywhere.”
“As he said in his joint session (address), we were the ‘arsenal of democracy’ in World War II,” Sullivan said. “We’re going to be the ‘arsenal of vaccines’ over this next period to help end the pandemic.”
Read: Biden rebuffs GOP infrastructure offer, citing broader goals
After addressing the troops, Biden and first lady Jill Biden flew to Cornwall Airport Newquay, then traveled by car to Tregenna Castle in St. Ives, where they are staying until Sunday.
Building toward his trip-ending summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Biden will aim to reassure European capitals that the United States can once again be counted on as a dependable partner to thwart Moscow’s aggression both on their eastern front and their internet battlefields.
The trip will be far more about messaging than specific actions or deals. And the paramount priority for Biden is to convince the world that his Democratic administration is not just a fleeting deviation in the trajectory of an American foreign policy that many allies fear irrevocably drifted toward a more transactional outlook under Trump.
“The trip, at its core, will advance the fundamental thrust of Joe Biden’s foreign policy,” Sullivan said, “to rally the world’s democracies to tackle the great challenges of our time.”
Biden’s to-do list is ambitious.
In their face-to-face sit-down in Geneva, Biden wants to privately pressure Putin to end myriad provocations, including cybersecurity attacks on American businesses by Russian-based hackers, the jailing of opposition leader Alexei Navalny and repeated overt and covert efforts by the Kremlin to interfere in U.S. elections.
Biden is also looking to rally allies on their COVID-19 response and to urge them to coalesce around a strategy to check emerging economic and national security competitor China even as the U.S. expresses concern about Europe’s economic links to Moscow. Biden also wants to nudge outlying allies, including Australia, to make more aggressive commitments to the worldwide effort to curb global warming.
The week-plus journey is a big moment for Biden, who traveled the world for decades as vice president and as chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and has now stepped off Air Force One onto international soil as commander in chief. He will face world leaders still grappling with the virus and rattled by four years of Trump’s inward-looking foreign policy and moves that strained longtime alliances as the Republican former president made overtures to strongmen.
The president first attends a summit of the Group of Seven leaders in the U.K., and then visits Brussels for a NATO summit and a meeting with the heads of the European Union. The trip comes at a moment when Europeans have diminished expectations for what they can expect of U.S. leadership on the foreign stage.
Central and Eastern Europeans are desperately hoping to bind the U.S. more tightly to their security. Germany is looking to see the U.S. troop presence maintained there so it doesn’t need to build up its own. France, meanwhile, has taken the tack that the U.S. can’t be trusted as it once was and that the European Union must pursue greater strategic autonomy going forward.
“I think the concern is real that the Trumpian tendencies in the U.S. could return full bore in the midterms or in the next presidential election,” said Alexander Vershbow, a former U.S. diplomat and once deputy secretary general of NATO.
The sequencing of the trip is deliberate: Biden consulting with Western European allies for much of a week as a show of unity before his summit with Putin.
Biden holds a sitdown Thursday with British Prime Minster Boris Johnson a day ahead of the G-7 summit to be held above the craggy cliffs of Cornwall overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.
The most tactile of politicians, Biden has grown frustrated by the diplomacy-via-Zoom dynamics of the pandemic and has relished the ability to again have face-to-face meetings that allow him to size up and connect with world leaders. While Biden himself is a veteran statesman, many of the world leaders he will see in England, including Johnson and French President Emmanuel Macron, took office after Biden left the vice presidency. Another, Germany’s Angela Merkel, will leave office later this year.
There are several potential areas of tension. On climate change, the U.S. is aiming to regain its credibility after Trump pulled the country back from the fight against global warming. Biden could also feel pressure on trade, an issue to which he’s yet to give much attention. And with the United States well supplied with COVID-19 vaccines yet struggling to persuade some of its own citizens to use it, leaders whose inoculation campaigns have been slower have been pressuring Biden to share more surplus around the globe.
Another central focus will be China. Biden and the other G-7 leaders will announce an infrastructure financing program for developing countries that is meant to compete directly with Beijing’s Belt-and-Road Initiative. But not every European power has viewed China in as harsh a light as Biden, who has painted the rivalry with the techno-security state as the defining competition for the 21st century.
The European Union has avoided taking as strong a stance on Beijing’s crackdown on Hong Kong’s democracy movement or treatment of Uyghur Muslims and other ethnic minorities in the western Xinjiang province as the Biden administration may like. But there are signs that Europe is willing to put greater scrutiny on Beijing.
Biden is also scheduled to meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan while in Brussels, a face-to-face meeting between two leaders who have had many fraught moments in their relationship over the years.
The trip finale will be Biden’s meeting with Putin.
Biden has taken a very different approach to Russia than Trump’s friendly outreach. Their sole summit, held in July 2018 in Helsinki, was marked by Trump’s refusal to side with U.S. intelligence agencies over Putin’s denials of Russian interference in the election two years earlier.
Biden rebuffs GOP infrastructure offer, citing broader goals
President Joe Biden has dismissed a fresh Republican infrastructure proposal that offered modestly more spending but fell short of “his objectives to grow the economy,” the White House said.
His reaction Friday cast further doubt on the two parties’ prospects for striking compromise on one of the administration’s chief legislative priorities as deadlines slip and time runs out to make progress toward a deal.
The White House released the statement after Biden spoke by phone with West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, the chief GOP negotiator. Both sides said the two would speak again on Monday, but Biden’s team made clear the president will be casting about for talks with other senators.
“The President expressed his gratitude for her effort and goodwill, but also indicated that the current offer did not meet his objectives to grow the economy, tackle the climate crisis, and create new jobs,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said.
READ: US to swiftly boost global vaccine sharing, Biden announces
A Capito statement provided no detail about their discussion or the new offer.
Making the pitch for Republicans, Capito had suggested around a $50 billion boost above the previous Republican offer of $928 billion, the White House said, still leaving the GOP well short of the $1.7 trillion that Biden is seeking.
In a further sign that a deal with Capito was seeming increasingly less likely, the White House said Biden told Capito that he would “continue to engage a number of Senators in both parties in the hopes of achieving a more substantial package.”
For weeks, the president has been engaged in talks with GOP senators trying to strike a compromise on Biden’s top legislative a priority, the big infrastructure investment package. While the two sides appear to have narrowed the price gap between his initial $2.3 trillion proposal and the GOP’s $568 billion opening bid, they remain far apart on the scope of the deal and how to pay for it.
Biden wants to raise corporate taxes to generate revenues for the infrastructure investments, a nonstarter for Republicans. The GOP senators propose tapping unspent COVID-19 relief aid to pay for the roads, bridges and other projects, an idea rejected by Democrats.
Earlier in the day, after the release of a modest May jobs report, Biden made the case for his robust investment package to push the economy past the COVID-19 crisis and downturn, and into a new era.
“Now is the time to build on the progress we’ve made,” Biden told reporters in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. “We need to make those investments today to continue to succeed tomorrow.”
After returning to the White House, Biden spoke with Capito by telephone. The White House had been eyeing a deadline early next week as Congress returns from its Memorial Day break to see progress toward a deal. Meanwhile, Democrats are setting the ground work for a go-it-alone approach. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has indicated that Biden will look to act without Republican support if there is no consensus.
READ: Free beer, other new incentives for Biden’s ‘vaccine sprint’
Psaki downplayed any hard-set deadline Friday and said the administration continues to talk to lawmakers from both parties.
“There’s runway left,” Psaki told reporters at the White House. “We’re going to keep a range of pathways open.”
Republicans are showing no interest in Biden’s latest proposal for a 15% corporate minimum tax rate that would ensure all companies pay something in taxes, rather than allowing so many write-offs or deductions that they contribute zero to the Treasury.
A Republican familiar with the talks and granted anonymity to discuss the private assessment said the GOP senators view that idea as an unnecessary tax hike. They had already rejected his initial proposal to hike the corporate tax rate, from 21% to 28%,
Instead, Republicans are insisting on using untapped COVID-19 relief funds to pay for the infrastructure investments. Biden’s team has rejected that approach.
Still, neither Biden nor the GOP senators appear ready to call off talks, even as Democrats prepare to use budget rules to pass any big package on their own, without Republican votes.
On Friday, House Democrats released a plan for spending $547 billion over the next five years on road, mass transit and rail projects, a blueprint of their priorities and a potential building block for Biden’s broader package.
The proposal from Oregon Rep. Peter DeFazio, the Democratic chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, continues existing programs set to expire and adds key pieces of the larger measure Biden is negotiating with Republicans.
DeFazio’s legislation doesn’t address how to pay for the projects. He called the effort a “once-in-a-generation opportunity to move our transportation planning out of the 1950s and toward our clean energy future.”
His bill would authorize up to $343 billion for roads, bridges and safety improvements. Another $109 billion would go to public transit programs and $95 billion would go to freight and passenger rail system, including a tripling of funding for Amtrak.
DeFazio’s bill is not expected to attract much GOP support, as Republicans unveiled their own legislation recently that would authorize about $400 billion over five years for road, bridge and transit programs.
Republicans on the House panel criticized the Democratic legislation in a statement. “Instead of working with Republicans to find common ground on a bill that could earn strong bipartisan support – something our Senate counterparts did successfully last month – this bill moves even further to the left to appease the most progressive members in the Majority’s party.”
Biden also called DeFazio on Friday to thank him for his work “on key elements of the American Jobs Plan,“ Psaki said, adding that they agreed on the benefits of continuing to engage Democratic and Republican senators.
Business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable have called on lawmakers to continue negotiations and work toward a bipartisan compromise.
But some Democrats have questioned the merits of that approach and are already unhappy with some of the compromises that Biden has offered. They support using a process that would allow Democrats to pass an infrastructure boost with a simple majority, which they did through a COVID-19 relief measure that delivered $1,400 payments to most Americans.
“Getting Republicans on board is not necessary. Getting the American people back on their feet is,” Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., said.