Should Progressives Allow the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill to Pass Before Democrats' Spending Plan?

What’s the story?

• Moderate Democrats are continuing to press their progressive peers to allow the House to pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill and send it to President Joe Biden’s desk before Democrats finalize their social spending plan, which they’ve been negotiating for weeks.
• The bipartisan bill, known as the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, passed the Senate in early August on a 69-30 vote. The House has delayed action on it since then, with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) reneging on a pledge to moderates to hold a vote on the bipartisan bill by the end of September as progressives threatened to block it absent an agreement on Democrats’ “social infrastructure” plan, which will advance through the budget reconciliation process.
• Pelosi has sided with progressives in tying the bipartisan infrastructure bill to Democrats’ reconciliation bill, insisting since June that, “There ain’t gonna be no bipartisan bill, unless we are going to have the reconciliation bill.” That’s due in part to Democrats’ threadbare majorities ― they can only afford three “nay” votes in the House and will require the support of all 50 members of the Senate Democratic caucus to eventually pass the reconciliation bill. Still, intra-party unity between moderates and progressives has been difficult to achieve to date.
• Moderate Democrats like Sens. Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) have been negotiating with progressives on a reconciliation bill that they can support, but there’s no indication that a deal will be reached in the immediate future. Sinema has also reportedly said that Pelosi’s decision to delay the bipartisan infrastructure bill caused a “breach in trust” and that she wants it to clear the House before the reconciliation bill comes up.
• Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), who along with Manchin and Sinema was part of the bipartisan group of senators that crafted the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, told CNN on Thursday that President Biden should tell the House to pass that bill now (along with a bipartisan bill that includes an expansion of semiconductor production); in part because of what’s expected to be a competitive gubernatorial election in Virginia this November:

“I think the president ought to tell the House that we ought to deliver on the infrastructure bill, I think we ought to deliver on the semiconductor bill as well. Let’s go ahead and take a couple of these wins… We’re 19 days from an election in Virginia. The president’s got a huge win sitting there.”

• Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), the co-chair of the House’s Progressive Caucus, reiterated on Thursday that progressives will block the infrastructure bill if it’s considered without the reconciliation bill advancing at the same time:

“Progressives in the House are holding the line to guarantee we can deliver on both the Build Back Better Act and infrastructure bill. Why? Because now is the time for transformative change.”

— Eric Revell

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