The NPR Politics Podcast - Weekly Roundup: December 17th

Episode Date: December 17, 2021

President Biden acknowledged Thursday that the centerpiece of his agenda, a nearly-two trillion dollar social programs package known as the Build Back Better Act, won't pass the Senate before Christmas as Democrats had hoped. West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin is a key holdout. But Congress was able to fund the government and raise the debt ceiling, despite doubts that they could reach consensus.And: is there a rising workers' and unionization movement in the United States? Many low-income workers have seen a sharp increase in their pay during the pandemic, though an increase in the cost of goods stemming from an overloaded supply chain has softened the impact of the pay jump. This episode: White House correspondent Tamara Keith, White House correspondent Asma Khalid, congressional correspondent Kelsey Snell, and business correspondent Alina Selyukh.Connect:Email the show at [e-mail] the NPR Politics Podcast Facebook Group.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 Jenny Werner. I'm in Lake Tahoe, California, and it's our third night without power. We're watching the snow fall outside and cooking on our wood-burning stove under our battery-operated Christmas lights. This show was recorded at, oh my gosh, 1.13 p.m. on Friday, the 17th of December. Things may have changed by the time you hear this, but I hope the power is back on, and thanks to the crews working all night. Hope you enjoy the show! Oh gosh.

I'm so impressed they used their limited power to send in a timestamp to us. I feel great sympathy, but then also I think they are going to have some sweet powder. There is going to be so much good snow. Upside, if it's snowing, you can put all the things from your fridge outdoors. Right. Ah, smart thinking. Outside fridge. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast.

I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Asma Khalid. I also cover the White House. And I'm Kelsey Snell. I cover Congress. President Biden in a Thursday evening statement acknowledged what had become kind of obvious, that there are roadblocks to his $2 trillion social spending package, the Build Back Better. It could take weeks before the package is ready for a vote if it happens. And Democrats had pledged to pass Biden's plan before Christmas. So, Kelsey, you know, other the next 24 hours, the math of the Senate clock just makes it impossible. Because not only do they have to go through the process of voting on just the concept of Build Back Better, they have to do a thing called a voterama, which is where they,

the Senate could have unlimited amendments. Sometimes that takes a whole day, sometimes it goes into a second day. So it's just not possible for them to kind of do all of the mechanical, you know, in the background stuff and then hold this vote. They were eventually going to have to admit what a lot of people have been, you know, tweeting and talking about for the past week or so, which is that they don't have a way out of this. They don't have unanimous agreement. And without that, they can't finish up. Okay, so there's one guy who we talk about all the time. His name is Joe Manchin from West Virginia. What does he want? What does he want? I know that we've asked this like a million times, but like, is there a specific issue right now? And is he the one key person? So, yes, I say with a question mark, because I can't totally answer the question about what it is he wants, because it keeps changing. And he keeps saying, oh, well, that's not what my issue is, or that's not what my issue is. Right now, it seems like the focus is on the child tax credit specifically. Democrats want is on the child tax credit specifically. Democrats want to make the child tax credit, which has now expanded and has been turned into a monthly payment for most families.

Democrats want to extend that monthly payment for one year. Right now, it expires at the end of this month when the clocks roll over. The last payment is done. Democrats want to extend that for a year. Manchin has said that he has concerns that what Democrats actually want to do is make this permanent. And he has concerns about the cost of that. And so he's starting to talk to them about wanting that to be built into the bill instead of letting it expire at the end of next year and then having this fight over and over again about renewing it. But that's just the latest thing that he's been asking for. He also has problems with the paid family leave portion that passed in the House. He has other issues with climate change

provisions. So there are a number of things that he has raised as issues, and it's kind of like a whack-a-mole game trying to keep track of which thing it is that he says is the thing preventing him from getting to a deal right now. I mean, Kelsey, that makes me inevitably feel like, a mole game trying to keep track of which thing it is that he says is the thing preventing him from getting to a deal right now. I mean, Kelsey, that makes me inevitably feel like, is he genuinely conflicted about these specific policy proposals? Or does he ultimately not believe that this package, at least in like the size and the scope that it is, should actually pass? That is the question that Democrats have been asking for weeks, if not months now, because, you know, he keeps saying and people who are negotiating with him

keep saying that he's working in good faith. But then other Democrats say, well, if he's working in good faith, find a compromise. Let's move forward. Why does why does a new issue always keep coming up? There are plenty of people and I'm thinking of members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus in particular, who say, well, he isn't negotiating in good faith because that's not what this looks like. Yeah. I mean, is this Lucy and the football or is it whack-a-mole? Right. And the only person who can really answer that is Manchin himself, and he hasn't been answering that question. Instead, he's actually just been getting mad at reporters who keep asking. Asma, I have to imagine that this is frustrating for the White House. You know, like this cleared the House a bit ago. They, you know, it's like two steps forward, one step back, one step forward, two steps back. Yeah, I mean, look,

Democrats as a whole, the White House included, really wanted this legislation to pass. It is a like a hallmark piece of his agenda, right? We talk about infrastructure a lot on this podcast, that passed. And then this big social safety net climate package was supposed to be the other big piece of legislation that the White House wanted to pass before the end of the year. And we keep talking about before the end of the year, because once you move into next year, after the holidays, a lot of members of Congress, and I mean, Kelsey, you can speak to this better, they're going to start thinking about the midterms if people aren't already thinking about the midterms. And there's a really short timeline for the White House to get

pieces of the president's agenda passed. You know, at the same time, the president's approval ratings have been underwater. I'm not sure that I would really tie it to the legislative inaction. I actually think that it's about a whole, of other factors, namely COVID and the economy. But that being said, when you don't have great approval ratings, it's also really hard to not have anything else moving in your direction right now, specifically your legislative agenda. ask about some of the more progressive members of the House conference, people like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Cori Bush, a few others, who actually voted against the bipartisan infrastructure plan because they were afraid that they were giving up leverage that they could have used to get their Senate colleagues to act on this bill, the Build Back Better bill. So is this stalling out evidence that they were right? They say it is. I mean, this is exactly what they've been arguing is that they made compromises here. I remember very specifically standing in a probably COVID unsafe scrum with

Pramila Jayapal, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, when she came out of a meeting and said to all of us that they were moving forward because they trusted the administration and the administration trusted Joe Manchin. This was a trust exercise. And they're beginning to feel like they got a little bit punked here, right? Like they're the ones who did the trusting and got nothing in return. Can we just pause on this debt ceiling thing really quick? Because as we are closing out this year, there have been a lot of things that could have gone catastrophically badly that turned out to not be a big deal. Like the government didn't shut down. The debt ceiling wasn't reached. Congress did do some of the basic functions of running a country, and it happened without much fanfare, ultimately. And the other thing that really stands out to me

is that two years ago, a year ago, when similar cliffs came up, there was always the uncertainty, the question of, oh, wow, Congress got this deal, but is the president going to sign it or is he going to blow the whole thing up and yell at his members of his own party? And this time, it's basically like if something passes, you knew the president was going to sign it. There wasn't a question. So when it comes like the debt limit and to knew the president was going to sign it. There wasn't a question. So when it comes like the debt limit and to funding the government, some of that was because, honestly, Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell do have a pretty decent working relationship.

They disagree on a lot of things, but they have meetings. They talk. They seem to be kind of moving through the basic functions of government. McConnell didn't want to shut down. McConnell didn't want a debt of government. McConnell didn't want a shutdown. McConnell didn't want a debt limit breach. He didn't want default. So he was willing to work with Schumer on that. And I think some of it also was that the Biden administration just doesn't want the chaos. Yeah, no, they do not see an advantage in chaos. It's not part of their brand. All right, let's leave it there for now. Kelsey, don't go far because you're coming back for Can't Let It Go. I cannot wait. I'll talk to you guys soon. Bye.

And we're back. And Alina Selyuk of NPR's business team is here with us. Hello. Hello, hello. So we have brought you here because you report on employment and labor issues. And it seems like the U.S. is going through a moment. There's a lot going on, yes. Yeah, there is a lot going on with regards to fights around labor unions.

There was an Amazon warehouse that might unionize still, the first Starbucks to unionize, fights at John Deere and Kellogg and a whole lot more. So talk to us about what you have observed with all of these various unionization efforts. It's a bit of a labor moment, as you pointed out. And there had been some strikes leading into the pandemic, but the pandemic really seemed to kind of crack open the American economy and kind of expose its biggest fault lines, and especially in the labor world. The biggest thing this year that I've been watching has been the conversation around wages. Just to say it out loud, the federal minimum wage remains $7.25. That's remarkable.

$7.25. And yet we keep hearing all these conversations about $15. It's just, yeah. Wages in the U.S. had stagnated for years, generally speaking. Specifically speaking, in lower wage jobs, wages had stagnated for years. And this is the thing that has been the most remarkable to me to see a little bit of last year and especially this year. Wages in the private sector have been growing up, especially in retail, especially in restaurants and bars, have been going up at a rate we hadn't seen in years. And so while the law, sort of the legal standard, remains $7.25, all these strikes, all of these, we'll talk a little

bit about the quote unquote great resignation, right? They have created a moment in which so many large retailers, large restaurant chains have now just sort of gone, okay, $15 sounds great. We're going for $15. Walgreens, CVS, Sam's Club, Starbucks, Walt Disney World, Chipotle, these are just some of the companies that came out this year, last year saying, you know what, we're going for $15 an hour. You've got Amazon going even higher. You've got Costco going for $17 an hour, etc, etc, etc. The list goes on. Yeah, I mean, it sounds like you are saying that this isn't just a few highly visible outliers, but that there's a real trend here and it's really connected to the pandemic. Exactly. The pandemic created an environment in which we had that longstanding sort of conversation about quote unquote essential workers and what essential jobs looked like. And suddenly, you know, groups

of people who work in grocery stores, who take care of our sick, who work in education, they realized that, you know, they didn't have the privilege of remote work. They had to labor through the worst of the pandemic and continue to do so. And then millions of them started quitting their jobs. And so you have that moment of millions of people deciding to leave. I think at the last count, over one million jobs are open in retail and have been every month since May. Over one and a half million jobs are open in hotel restaurants and bars because people are quitting these jobs that they realize they couldn't do anymore for the pay that was offered. No benefits, very, you know, very few days off, et cetera, et cetera, whatever the circumstances.

And so you take that and then add to the fact that the economy is, you know, recovering. And then there's this massive amount of shopping that's happening, massive amount of spending that's happening. The companies need to fill these jobs. And you've got either people who are quitting and saying, you know what, I can find a better job elsewhere. Or you've got people who are saying, you know what, now is the time to try to organize. This is what we heard from Lexi Rizzo, who was one of the organizers at Starbucks in Buffalo, New York. With the pandemic, with all of the labor shortages across the nation, it was finally the perfect storm where for once we weren't disposable as food service employees anymore because there was no one to replace us. So it was just the

perfect time. It really helped galvanize the partners to find their inner courage. Asma, President Biden talks a lot about good paying union jobs. Other than using that phrase all the time, what has Biden been doing to sort of support this or to put his weight behind some of these union efforts? You know, he has, I think, put pro workerworker people in the administration, too, in top roles. Yeah. I mean, the person who comes most to mind, I would say, is the labor secretary, the former mayor of Boston, Marty Walsh. He is a card-carrying union man. I believe he's the first labor secretary in some decades to actually have been a union member. What kind of union? I believe he was actually the head of the Boston building trades before he became the mayor of Boston. I think that was a job he had immediately prior to becoming the mayor. And, you know, I think to me, that's symbolically important, just in terms of who

he's putting in this particular position. But to your point, Tam, I mean, a lot of this is also rhetoric. And he has certainly used the power, they would say, of the presidency, the rhetoric that he's been using and saying, to emphasize that he really does believe that the middle class, as he says, built America and that unions built the middle class. That's like a line we heard ad nauseum during the campaign. And it's something that we've continued to hear him say. Now, how that actually translates into policy, I don't know that we really have a clear sense of that. I mean, we were just talking earlier about this build back better agenda. A lot of what the president has wanted to do on the legislative front has just really been stalled. We are talking about

unionization efforts and very clearly rising wages, particularly for lower wage workers. This is also happening in the midst of a really weird economic moment where you have inflation for the first time in our lifetimes. Real inflation. So pretty serious. Yeah. So are these are these things related? Yes and no. Anecdotally, some stores, businesses will say that they've had to raise wages to attract more workers or the workers that they need to accommodate the shoppers and clients and customers. And so then they're trying to raise prices to offset that cost. Now, data wise, we haven't seen that reflected. The Federal Reserve says they're not seeing that kind of, you know, relation, the feedback loop between wages and prices that like we did see in the 70s. But that's definitely something we're watching. And then sort of on

a human level, what that means is if I am a restaurant worker and average wages for restaurant workers cross that $15 line in May. And so now, on average, a regular store worker at a restaurant is making not quite $16 an hour, but the prices are going up. And that means that wage victory of sorts is just not worth as much. The price increases are erasing a bit of that value of the money. And that's certainly a political problem for the Biden administration, right? I mean, there was this report put out by the Wharton Business School earlier this week that I've seen some Republican groups circulating that basically said they estimate that the average American household is going to have to spend around $3,500 more in 2021, they were saying, or that they have spent more to achieve the same level of like buying goods that they would have

spent in the year prior. And so to your point, you know, Alina, even if people are getting higher wages, say they got a bonus, it actually kind of equals out, maybe even is still putting them underwater because things are just costing a lot more at the grocery store. And that's why I'm really curious to see how the minimum wage conversation progresses from here. Because for so many years, it was all about, you know, oh, will somebody propose $15 an hour? Will somebody propose even higher? Is $15 an hour too expensive for businesses? Will we see major layoffs? The pandemic produced those major layoffs. We saw the economy just topsy-turvy for months on end. We saw millions of people quitting jobs, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Where do we go from now? Are we going to be talking about $15 an hour

minimum wage? Is that even relevant? All right. Well, let's leave it there for today. Alina Selyuk, thanks so much for being on the pod. Thank you. Thank you. And when we get back, it's time for Can't Let It Go. And we're back. And it's time to end the show like we do every week with Can't Let It Go, the part of the show where we talk about the things from the week that we just can't stop talking about, politics or otherwise. Asma, you first. So some of y'all probably heard about this, especially if you're a big political junkie,

avid listener to the NPR Politics podcast. But long story short, the other week, the White House announced that those rapid at-home COVID tests are now going to be reimbursable through insurance. If you, you know, you buy one from CVS Walgreens, you can fill out your little insurance form, submit it back, you know, get the money back. And so Mara Liason, our dear colleague, asked the press secretary at the White House the other week, well, you know, that's kind of complicated. Why not just make these tests free and easily accessible to everyone? Why not just make them free and give them out and have them available everywhere?

Should we just send one to every American? Maybe. Maybe. So anyhow, long story short, Mara went viral. And I am like amazed because it isn't ending. Like there are still tweets about her. Oh, I know. But basically, don't ask Mara a question that you don't want to get an answer to. Well, exactly. Mara is one of the most unshakable human beings I have ever met. And she is already thinking about whatever potential answer might be coming. So she is not

the person you want to like get into an exchange like that with. So shout out to Mara, living legend. Oh yeah, no, there's even an Onion article headline. And what do you want me to do? Brush every night? Snaps Jen Psaki at dentists suggesting she could improve oral hygiene. There's this tweet that was sent around yesterday that I've been seeing some people circulate where this guy says, White House reporter, colon, we can mitigate the spread of COVID by making rapid tests free and accessible. Jen Psaki, colon, how about I mitigate your mom? LMAO.

Oops. Next question. Yeah. So I'm going to go next. And I have two kids. One of them is over the age of five and is now fully vaccinated as of last night. And as part of our negotiation over his desire not to get the second dose and his attempt to literally run away from the needle. I agreed that I would take him to Chuck E. Cheese

to celebrate being fully vaccinated. And he loves that place so much that during the pandemic, we were actually ordering pizza from Chuck E. Cheese as like takeout. And sometimes we ordered like these birthday party packs and got cake too. I did not know this was even possible until you told us this. Like some time ago, I was like, you can order Chuck E. Cheese. This is amazing to me. packs and got cake too. I did not know this was even possible until you told us this like some time ago. I was like, you can order Chuck E. Cheese. This is amazing to me because I thought it was like an experiential pizza. Yeah. You know, I had so much fun playing skeeball last night and

the whack of something or other. And it was, we had an awesome little date and it was not as terrible as I remember it being, probably because it was nearly empty. That's amazing. Kelsey, what can't you let go of? OK, so mine is a bit of an update. So for listeners who come back here every Friday, you will know that we have discussed the zebras of Maryland many times. So there are these zebras that got out of a farm in August, and they have just been out on the loose, wandering around just in Maryland, showing up in people's suburban backyards. This is such a wild story to me. Right. Well, my update for our good listeners is that they have been found. Well, at least two of them have been found. One of them, sadly, did not make it through this journey and was found dead pretty quickly after his escape. It's okay.

He is. But the two zebras were returned. The funny thing is, though, the thing that I really can't let go of about this, because, you know, I guess I assume that they would eventually get found, that there is, like like still mystery around how they were found and what's going to happen to them. That all of the reporting says that they have been captured or returned. Actually, I think the word I see most often is recovered, but none of the details include how they were recovered, when, and exactly what's going to happen to them. Because the guy who owns this zebra herd, which I guess includes about 30 zebras, during all of this was like charged with animal endangerment. Oh.

I don't know. So this is a drama that will continue. So this is an update, not a close of the chapter. Also, owning 30 zebras is like a lot of zebras, right? I feel like you go to the zoo and you see one zebra. I feel like owning two zebras is a lot of zebras. One zebra is a lot of zebras to have in your personal collection. I think the lesson of the last two years is simply personal zoos are a bad idea. Yeah. And maybe we could get Zebra King on Netflix Coming soon. All right. That's a wrap for today.

Our executive producer is Mithani Mathuri. Our editors are Krishnadev Kalamar and Eric McDaniel. Our producers are Barton Girdwood, Elena Moore, and Lexi Schapittle. And thanks to Brandon Carter. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Asma Khalid. I also cover the White House.

And I'm Kelsey Snell. I cover Congress. And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.