The NPR Politics Podcast - Congress Passes Biden's Trillion-Dollar Transit, Broadband, And Power Bill

Episode Date: November 8, 2021

It is a major political victory for President Biden, though it remains to be seen whether it will buoy his approval ratings or boost support for Democrats in Congress.This episode: White House correspondent Scott Detrow, national political correspondent Mara Liasson, and acting congressional correspondent Deirdre Walsh.Connect:Subscribe to the NPR Politics Podcast here.Email the show at [e-mail] the NPR Politics Podcast Facebook Group.Listen to our playlist The NPR Politics Daily Workout.Subscribe to the NPR Politics Newsletter.Find and support your local public radio station.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Hi, this is Luke from Brooklyn, New York, and I just crossed the starting line at the New York City Marathon. This podcast was recorded at... I assume Luke was not that excited 26.2 miles later. It is, I hope he finished though, it is is 206 Eastern on Monday, November 8th. Pretty cool. Things may have changed by the time you hear this, but please enjoy the show. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Scott Detrow. I cover the White House.

I'm Deirdre Walsh. I cover Congress. And I'm Mara Liason, national political correspondent. Speaking of marathons, after months of tense negotiations and blown deadlines, the House of Representatives late, late Friday, more like early Saturday, maybe, passed a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill. This fulfills a major priority for President Biden's domestic agenda and cements a political victory for Democrats. We did something that's long overdue, that long has been talked about in Washington, but never actually been done. The House of Representatives passed an Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. That's a fancy way of saying a bipartisan infrastructure bill. Of course, there's that other bill that has not yet passed, whose fate really overshadowed what should have been a clear victory for Biden. We'll talk about

that a little bit. But today, let's mostly talk about the thing that is about to become a law. Deirdre, we are going to talk so much. We have focused so much on the really interesting political storylines. But let's start here by what is in this bill, what is about to become a reality. What are some of the highlights? I mean, this is a big deal. In Washington, there's been talk and jokes about Infrastructure Week for years. And they actually passed a bill that the president's going to sign this week. It has over $100 billion in it for roads and bridges. It has $66 billion for rail projects. President Biden likes to talk about how many miles he's traveled on Amtrak. They're going to get a lot of money from this

bill. There's $39 billion for public transit systems, $25 billion for airports, electric vehicle charging stations across the country. Another big thing that got a lot of money is broadband networks. A lot of communities in this country, especially rural communities, aren't connected, and there's $65 billion in here to make that happen. So this is all money that's, you know, going to go out the door, you know, in the next few months, or years, that will really, you know, update badly, you know, crumbling infrastructure across the country and create a lot of jobs. A lot of these projects seem like the exact type of thing that

could really get somebody's attention that, hey, government is working for me. Government is directly approving my life. That's such like a fundamental thesis of Biden, the Biden White House's politics. And yet we have seen so many signs that things like that just don't really register in people's brains right now. Any sense that this could be different? Look, I'm the national political correspondent, so I want to know if this is going to help Biden politically. And it's unclear because, you know, getting things done and delivering for the American people is supposed to be good politics. The process of getting things done, the sausage making is very bad politics, especially for a president and a party who ran on – they were the party of government.

They were going to use government to help ordinary people. And it took many, many months of internecine fighting during which the president's approval ratings dropped precipitously for many other reasons. But one big one was that it took so long to pass this bill. So I don't know in the end, will people feel that it's a great accomplishment? Will they give Biden and the Democrats credit? One of the questions I have for Deirdre in terms of the political strategy of this, this bill was held hostage by progressives in the House for a very long time. They said they wanted it coupled with the human infrastructure bill, the Build Back Better bill. In the end, that didn't happen. They got a kind of good faith

statement from moderates saying as long as the CBO score checks out and the bigger human infrastructure bill doesn't add to the deficit, they'll vote for that. But in the end, they didn't get what they held out for so long. And what I'm wondering is the process of holding out for that long really undermined the president and his party because they looked like they couldn't deliver. Right. And it was super messy. I mean, remember, this is the third time that Nancy Pelosi moved this bill forward. The first two times, she was essentially blocked by the Progressive Caucus, because as Mara said, they wanted these two bills to move in tandem, this bill along with the broader domestic policy bill that they wanted to be voted on essentially back to back. I mean, the bill still did pass, though. It's just that it passed after months and months of

confusing and contentious debates and blown deadlines and lots of, you know, comments from lawmakers that made this seem like less of an accomplishment than it would. I do want to ask you, Mara, about one thing we haven't touched on yet. One of the big political positives of this all along for Biden was that it was bipartisan. Remember, 900 years ago when he came out of the White House with a bunch of Republican senators. In the end, how bipartisan was this? 13 Republicans voted for it. That means that 13 Republicans bucked their leadership because, remember, the House Republican leadership was whipping against this. They didn't want any Republicans to help the Democrats get this over the finish line.

And, you know, so who got more of their caucus to vote for this? Nancy Pelosi did, not Kevin McCarthy. You know, she lost six Democrats, but he lost 13 Republicans. But I think the thing you said that in the end, it looked like less of an accomplishment. When progressives basically trashed this bill for months and months, made it seem like this bill was meaningless, not a very big accomplishment, that's going to make it harder to sell it as a great victory. And quite frankly, it is a big accomplishment. And I do want to mention one thing about that. The part that I focused the most on was the climate provisions. And there was a lot

of progressive criticism there, because certainly compared to what Democrats are trying to do in this other bill, there was really not as much climate and no policies that would massively lower the country's carbon footprint. But, you know, there are still a lot of things that could make a big difference down the line, specifically trying to really boost the infrastructure for electric vehicle charging stations to try and in the next decade or so, totally turn over, you know, the types of vehicles on the roads. If that actually did happen, that would be a big deal. There is a lot of money for things like that, for things like infrastructure resiliency to try and deal with the effects of climate change. So there's a lot of stuff in here, but again,

wasn't really talked about for months and months. Right. As policy, it's a big deal. We don't know if it's going to convince people that Biden is an effective president because the expectations were so high for him. He was the guy with experience who knew how to govern, who knew how to work across the aisle. And that didn't happen for a really long time. There's a lot to continue talking about, especially looking forward. Let's take a quick break. And when we come back, we'll talk more about what happens next and how much of a difference this bill being signed into law can make. Okay, we are back. Well, I guess first of all, Deirdre, congratulations. We don't have to say BIF anymore. You never have to say BIF, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Framework. Do you feel good about that?

I'm glad about that. And I'm also glad that we don't have to hear we're going to land this plane, which I heard for hours and hours and hours on Friday, which finally happened at 1130 at night. Final BIF question for for both of you. I'm curious how you would reality check something that we've heard from a lot of lawmakers, particularly Virginia Senator Tim Kaine, that if only the BIF had passed a few weeks earlier, a month earlier, that could have made the difference that could have gotten the Democratic base a little more excited. Terry McAuliffe could be the next governor of Virginia instead of Glenn Youngkin. Gut feeling you think you think there's anything to? Deirdre, I'll start with you. I'm skeptical. I mean, I live in Virginia. And, you know, I've been hearing, as anyone who lives in this area has for months, the ads about this race. I don't think that an infrastructure bill

would have helped Terry McAuliffe win. I think it would have helped Democrats, as you said, you know, maybe get a little bit more enthusiastic about coming out and voting and touting an accomplishment. I mean, certainly the roads in this area and the infrastructure needs more upgrades. And the issue of congestion has always been a big issue in statewide races here. But I think the election in Virginia wasn't so much about the economy and the federal infusion of infrastructure money. I think it was a different conversation. And education played a key role in that. Yeah, I mean, look, I think there's no way to know whether having passed this bill earlier would have helped Terry McAuliffe. Terry McAuliffe certainly thought so.

He was begging them to pass it. But I would say that the fact they didn't pass it hurt him. I don't know if passing it would have gotten him over the finish line, but not passing it hurt him because it hurt all Democrats. It looked like they didn't know what they were doing, and all they were doing was squabbling among themselves. Just the picture of Biden standing in the driveway of the White House with Democrats and Republicans having passed this bill is what he needed and what the whole party needed. And they didn't get it until in some ways the damage had been done.

That leads me to my next question. I feel like I'm asking you both a lot of questions today where you're like, I don't know. We'll see. This might be another one of those. Time will tell, Scott. The plane is still circling and landing. you both a lot of questions today where you're like, I don't know, we'll see. But so this might be another one of those. Time will tell, Scott. The plane is still circling and landing. I mean, Mara, Biden has really had a huge slump for a lot of reasons, some in his control, some out of his control, going back to, you know, about mid-August, COVID, the supply chain, Afghanistan, a few other things. This is a major deal that gets passed.

This is something that can affect people in their real lives. He is going to have a big signing ceremony. I assume he will find some Republicans to stand next to him. Is this the type of thing that can start turning political fortunes around for a president? Sure. If they can be turned around, this is the kind of thing. Oh, qualifier. Yeah.

That gets him back to his brand, a guy who knows how to govern, work across the aisle, can get things done, and believes that government can help ordinary people. And here he's just going to sign something that's going to create a ton of jobs. So, yes, they have to be able to sell it because, remember, the COVID relief bill, which was another giant accomplishment, cut child poverty in half, gave $1,400 checks to I think something like 80% of Americans. They didn't sell it and people didn't know that they got that stuff because of the Democrats and Biden. People who have money going into their checking accounts every single month because of that bill are still not directly connecting it. Yep. Now it's possible that they might know they got it from the Democrats, but they still will vote Republican because of cultural issues. But they didn't know.

Deirdre, any sense of how this – now when we talk about these bills, we can just talk about one bill. We've really been talking about one bill for a while anyway, but this is the reconciliation measure, the one packed with a wide range of Democratic priorities. At last check-in, Joe Manchin was pouring a ton of cold water on it right at the moment where Biden was at the climate summit in Glasgow, where I was covering him saying, we're going to pass these big things. And then Joe Manchin says, I don't know about that. Any sense of how this finally getting passed affects things? You know, among other things, Manchin was saying, listen, stop trying to hold this hostage. It's not going to affect my vote. I think Manchin and Sinema are probably happy that the bipartisan infrastructure bill they wanted to move ahead and get signed is in fact moving ahead and getting signed. But I think we

could be back in the Democrats fighting amongst themselves phase again pretty soon because House Democrats finally did come together on a framework for this reconciliation bill. You know, they agreed and compromised to bring the price tag down from the $3.5 trillion. Now it's $1.75 trillion. But then they added things to it that Manchin publicly has said he opposes. They added four weeks of paid family leave. That's going to get stripped out in the Senate. They added immigration provisions, protections for immigrants who've been in the country since 2011. It's unclear whether that will be sustained in the Senate. It could be a violation of the rules for this budget measure. So I think that they've made a lot of progress in terms of bringing the party together around

a proposal that could get 50 votes in the Senate, but it's going to change again. There's going to be more fighting about, you know, these different provisions. And I think a lot of Democrats want to get past that because they saw what happened in Virginia, and they want to be able to talk about the things in the bill as opposed to the price tag and the fight between the centrists and the progressives. But I think we could be in for several more weeks of wrangling. All right, goodbye to Biff. We'll be back in your feed the rest of the week talking about the reconciliation bill and other political news. I'm Scott Detrow. I cover the White House. I'm Deirdre Walsh. I cover Congress. And I'm Mara Liason,

national political correspondent. Thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.