But look a little closer, with a dose of optimism, and perhaps a different picture will emerge now that Joe Biden has been declared victorious in the presidential race: a lineup that might actually work to get a few things done.
In this more optimistic view, Mr. Biden in the White House, an almost evenly divided Senate perhaps still under Republican leader Mitch McConnell and a more narrowly divided House could become a combination that propels everyone in the capital toward the center. terrain and empowers moderates on both sides.
Of course, the precise layout of the terrain cannot yet be known. President Trump has not admitted to the presidential race, and his campaign immediately made it clear that he intends to continue fighting in court for the outcome of the election. Senate control will not be known until races are called in North Carolina and Alaska, and until two tiebreaker races are completed in Georgia in January.
Still, Republicans are more likely to claim at least three of those four, which would leave them in the tiniest of majorities in the Senate, and Mr. McConnell in the majority leader’s chair. In any event, a President Biden would take office with less congressional backing from his own Democratic Party than did Barack Obama or Bill Clinton.
However, the biggest question that has ever been asked about a possible Biden presidency is whether he can maintain control of the emerging progressive wing of his own party, which tried during this year’s Democratic primary season and has since pushed the centrist. Mr. Biden further. to the left of what you really want to go.
In the emerging power structure, Biden can use his own performance in the presidential race, which was stronger than his party’s overall result, to claim a clearer mandate for his agenda than the more progressive one. Additionally, you can point to Republican influence in the Senate and an expanded Republican base in the House as one reason why you can’t go as far as your party liberals would like on taxes, climate change and healthcare.
Furthermore, in a balanced Senate, whichever party is in control by one or two seats, the centrists of both parties enjoy greater influence. That means, at least potentially, greater power for moderates like Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and newly re-elected Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine. They can make the difference between stalemate and bipartisan action.
Beyond that, Messrs. Biden and McConnell proved in the years of the Obama administration that, left to their own devices, they know how to make trains move. When the budget talks collided with the rocks, the two retired to a room for private conversations and emerged with a way to move between those rocks.
“There’s a scenario where you could get good politics out of this,” says independent election analyst Charlie Cook.
True, this is an optimistic view of the road ahead, perhaps even naive. Certainly the argument in favor of the reverse case – that we are heading towards hopeless stagnation – is plausible. Says so:
Even a defeated president, Trump, will not sit quiet at night, but, in his bitterness, will find a different path to wage war on the Democrats and the Republicans who compromise with them. He could scare or threaten Republicans into not compromising or cooperating with a president whom he will label as illegitimate.
The most strident Liberal Democrats have also shown no sign of reconsideration over the election results that showed their party losing ground amid claims by party moderates that the party was hurt by calls from the left to defund. to the police and the defense of policies that the republicans called socialists. Biden could still face a civil war within his own party.
For his part, McConnell is a masterful obstructionist when he wants to and will have the power to block confirmation of Biden’s judicial appointments, as he did with Merrick Garland’s nomination to the Supreme Court in the Obama era, and even with nominees. to Biden’s cabinet. . If Republicans in the Senate use a small power base to make a concerted effort to derail all of Biden’s judicial elections – and a significant portion of his cabinet – that could destroy hope for bipartisan goodwill.
Still, lawmakers who know they will face voters in 2022 in swing states will not want to be seen as purely obstructionist, but will want a track record of achievement to run on. That includes Republicans Rob Portman of Ohio, Marco Rubio of Florida and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, and Democrats Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire and Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada.
And if the Senate passes to Democratic control, the party leader there, Chuck Schumer, would have such a narrow margin that he would also have to pay attention to the more conservative members of his group, starting with Manchin.
In short, a President Biden would take office with a complicated power structure laid out before him. But if you’re smart and skilled, you could get a head start.
Write to Gerald F. Seib at [email protected]
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