[ad_1]
Usually, it is the first midterm election of a US president that reorders the political focus and priorities of the White House. For President-elect Joe Biden, his most defining congressional election comes before he takes office.
Two second-round votes on Tuesday (local time) in Georgia will decide which party controls the Senate and thus how far the new president can go legislatively on issues like the pandemic, healthcare, taxes, energy and the environment.
For a politician who sold himself to Americans as a unifier and a seasoned legislative agent, the Georgia elections will help determine if he can live up to their expectations.
“It’s not that nothing can be done in the minority or that everything is done in the majority, but having the gavel, having that leadership control can make the difference in the success or failure of an administration,” said Jim Manley, once top aide to former Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid, who served in front of current Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Both Georgia Democrats Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock must win Tuesday to split the Senate 50-50. Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, as Speaker of the Senate, would provide the necessary tiebreaker to determine control.
READ MORE:
* Donald Trump returns to Washington early in a final attempt to overturn Joe Biden’s victory
* Election in USA: Donald Trump attends a rally to support Georgia senators, instead pressing his own grievances
* Donald Trump’s last minute tantrum throws Covid-19 relief effort into chaos
To be sure, even a narrowly divided Democratic Senate would not give Biden everything he wants. Senate rules still require 60 votes to advance most important laws; for now, there aren’t enough Democrats willing to change that requirement. So regardless of Georgia’s results, Biden will have to win over Republicans in a Senate where a bipartisan group of more centrist senators can see their actions rise.
Patrick Semansky / AP
The second round of the election will have a huge impact on the first two years of Joe Biden’s presidency.
A Democratic Senate would still open an easier path for Biden’s nominees to key positions, especially in the federal judiciary, and give Democrats control of committees and much of the action in the room. By contrast, a McConnell-led Senate would almost certainly deny Biden major legislative victories, as it did at the end of President Barack Obama’s term, by preventing his agenda from getting votes for or against.
Biden’s team is keenly aware of what is at stake. The president-elect will travel to Atlanta on Monday, the eve of the runoff, to campaign with Ossoff and Warnock for the second time in three weeks. Biden’s campaign aides have helped raise millions to boost the party infrastructure that helped Biden become the first Democratic presidential candidate since 1992 to rule the state. Vice President-elect Kamala Harris will campaign Sunday in Savannah.
On his last visit, Biden called Republican senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler “obstacles” and urged Georgians to “vote for two United States senators who know how to say the word ‘yes’ and not just ‘no.’
Patrick Semansky / AP
President-elect Joe Biden, center, recognizes supporters at the end of a drive-in of Georgia’s Democratic US Senate candidates Raphael Warnock, left, and Jon Ossoff in Atlanta.
The makeup of Congress shapes any administration, but perhaps even more so for Biden, who spent 36 years in the Senate, plus eight as Obama’s vice president and main liaison to Congress. Biden relied on that résumé to present himself to the country as a consensus builder; He also criticized the increased use of executive action by presidents to surround Congress and insisted that it would be different in his presidency.
Even some Republicans are hopeful. Michael Steel, once a top adviser to Republican House Speaker John Boehner, an Obama boss along with McConnell, blamed Obama’s troubles on Capitol Hill on his personal approach to fellow politicians. Rather, Steel said, “President-elect Biden is a legislator by vocation, by training, by instinct, by experience, in a way that former President Obama was not.”
Steel predicted that Biden and McConnell, two former colleagues, may find “common ground” in infrastructure and immigration, policy areas that have stumped multiple administrations. Steel noted that a handful of Republican senators, including Marco Rubio of Florida and Rob Portman of Ohio, could face tough re-election battles in 2022, which could make them eager to close deals they could campaign for.
John Bazemore / AP
If he wins, Jon Ossoff would become a United States senator at just 33 years old.
Still, there is no indication that McConnell would allow consideration of other top priorities for Biden, most notably a “public option” expansion of the Affordable Care Act of 2010, which passed without a single Republican vote when Democrats they controlled both cameras on Capitol Hill. Biden’s proposed tax increases for corporations and the wealthiest Americans are also likely dead in a Republican Senate.
Biden will also need his negotiation skills to navigate the left flank of his own group. While progressives say they have lowered their expectations of what is possible, even under a Democratic Senate, they still intend to pressure Biden.
Larry Cohen, chairman of Our Revolution, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential nomination arm, said progressives will pressure Democrats in Congress to use the “budget reconciliation” process to get around the obstruction threshold. out of 60 Senate votes. Cohen argued that tactic could be used to achieve long-sought goals such as ending tax subsidies to fossil fuel companies and allowing the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to negotiate as a single customer with pharmaceutical companies.
Ben Gray / AP
Democratic Senate candidate Reverend Raphael Warnock is a pastor at a church where Martin Luther King Jr. once preached.
Those moves, Cohen noted, could generate considerable savings, creating new revenue even if Republicans do not agree to any tax increases.
He also said progressives will pressure Biden to use executive authority. He named two initiatives that Biden has publicly called for: ending new drilling on federal land and raising the minimum wage for federal contractors to $ 15 an hour, even if Congress doesn’t set that floor across the economy. Another progressive priority, canceling student debt under federal loan programs, is something Biden hasn’t said if he would be willing to try unilaterally.
Democrats’ limited expectations of their own power, even with a potential majority, belies the exaggerated claims Republicans have used in the Georgia election.
Andrew Harnik / AP
President-elect Joe Biden will take office later this month.
In Perdue and Loeffler’s account, a Democratic Senate would “seal” a “socialist agenda,” from “ending private insurance” and “expanding the Supreme Court” to adopting a “Green New Deal” that would spend billions and increase taxes. taxes on every American home for thousands of dollars each year In addition to misrepresenting the political preferences of Biden and most of the Democratic senators, that characterization ignores the reality of the Senate list.
At a campaign stop this week, Ossoff said Perdue’s “ridiculous” attacks “blow my mind.” He scoffed at the claim that his political views, which align closely with Biden, amount to a left-wing lunge. But the challenger agreed with the incumbent on the importance of Georgia’s second round.
“We have too much good work to do,” Ossoff said, “to be stuck and clogged for years to come.”
