Vulnerable House Democrats are facing a long and arduous pressure campaign to oppose President Biden’s $3.5 trillion party-line spending bill, with Republican-allied outfits prepared to spend millions to defeat what liberal supporters are calling the most “consequential” expansion of the federal government since the New Deal.
The pressure campaign, expressed through a planned deluge of negative ads and hostile town halls, has centrist House Democrats on the defensive. Compounding matters is that lawmakers are back in their districts during the congressional recess, giving them little recourse to avoid the reaction from voters.
“It’s going to be a long, hot and politically painful summer,” said one top Democratic aide, who requested anonymity on the topic. “We’re expecting it to be like the tea party-era, but worse.”
Many see the mounting pressure campaign as the reason for why Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has recalled the chamber to Washington for an initial vote on the package in mid-August.
“It wasn’t smart to keep these guys out there for a whole month,” said the Democratic aide.
Since the $3.5 trillion “human infrastructure” bill will be dealt with in the Senate via the budget reconciliation process, which allows spending measures to avoid the Senate’s 60-vote filibuster hurdle and pass with a simple majority, congressional Republicans are expected to contribute virtually no votes to its passage, putting the political onus squarely on the Democrats.
And with the tiniest of majorities in both chambers, Democrats can barely afford to suffer a single defection in their caucus and hope to pass Mr. Biden’s centerpiece bill.
The reality has Republicans and their allies mobilizing to ensure Democrats own every part of the package. The pressure was evident on Wednesday, only hours after the Senate took an initial vote to start drafting the bill.
The American Action Network, a national conservative group with close ties to the House GOP, announced it would spend more than $5 million running ads against the package. The ads are set to air in 39 congressional districts, targeting Democrats in marginal seats primed to flip next year.
Dan Conston, the group’s president, said the move will highlight what he sees as the divide between average voters and House Democrats when it comes to economic priorities.
“Inflation is already stretching families’ paychecks thinner than ever, and now Nancy Pelosi and her allies are running to take even more from their wallets with enormous tax increases and trillions for their far-left political priorities,” said Mr. Conston. “Liberal policies have brought disastrous consequences for workers from rising prices to a crippling labor shortage.”
Democrats have dubbed the $3.5 trillion bill “human infrastructure” as a complement to the more traditional $1 trillion road and bridges bipartisan bill that just passed the Senate this week. The legislation amounts to a wish list of liberal priorities — addressing such items as climate change, amnesty for illegal immigrants, free community college and expanded health care, all paid for by a repeal of the Trump-era tax cuts.
“The $3.5 trillion [package] … will be the most consequential piece of legislation for working people, the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor since FDR and the New Deal of the 1930s,” said Senate Budget Committee Chairman Bernard Sanders, a self-described socialist from Vermont.
Republicans say the legislation will only exacerbate inflation, kill the current economic recovery, and drive up the federal deficit.
“To put it simply,” said Sen. Bill Hagerty, a Tennessee Republican who led the opposition to the package. “it’s more government, more taxes, more spending, more debt, and more inflation on the backs of Tennessee families and workers and their children and grandchildren.”
Increasing the potency of the GOP’s argument is that the U.S. economy in recent months has shown serious signs of inflation. Across the board, consumers and companies alike have seen prices rise substantially, while employment has yet to fully recover after the coronavirus pandemic. The Biden administration argues the price jumps are temporary, reflecting pent-up demand and lagging supply from the COVID-19 economic shutdown.
This week, the Department of Labor reported that consumer prices jumped 5.4% compared to the same time a year prior, the largest jump since August 2008.
The inflation news has moderate Democrats flashing warning signals over the $3.5 trillion package, arguing that some of the spending and policy priorities will have to be scaled back.
Rep. Ron Kind of Wisconsin, a senior member of the moderate Blue Dog Coalition, announced his retirement on Tuesday just as Senate Democrats were preparing to take up the package. Mr. Kind is one of seven Democrats representing a congressional district won by former President Trump in 2020.
“The truth is I’ve run out of gas,” said Mr. Kind, adding that he was a “dying breed.”
In the lead-up to the announcement, Mr. Kind was facing a barrage of pressure from his likely GOP opponent over the $3.5 trillion package.
“That agenda has not changed and whoever is Nancy Pelosi’s hand-picked replacement is going to have to carry that water,” said Derrick Van Orden, the GOP challenger to Mr. Kind in 2020 who is running again next year for what will now be an open seat. “Wisconsin wants a change and they want it now.”
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