In the final vote count for the so-called “bipartisan” infrastructure bill now sailing towards President Joe Biden’s desk to become the law of the land, there were six Democratic “no” votes—all from a subset of House Democrats who Fox News considers equally interchangeable whenever it’s time to demonize the Democratic Party. They were Reps. Jamaal Bowman of New York, Cori Bush of Missouri, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan—collectively known as “The Squad.”
I admit it’s almost impossible to fathom what these folks could possibly have in common that might raise the blood pressure of the average Fox News viewer, but after much deliberation I’ve tentatively concluded it must be their fiendish political skills. As it turns out, their refusal to vote for the “socialist” (BiF) bill on principle has apparently driven the remainder of the GOP caucus over the edge with apoplexy. Because by withholding their votes in a display of unison, they helped lure in 13 GOP House members to vote for the bill, rescuing the beleaguered Democratic president from floundering in the eyes of the American public.
In their rush to condemn the now-expanded Squad for its apparent apostasy in failing to support the bipartisan bill, many Democrats apparently overlooked a subtle but unmistakable consequence: The votes were obvious trade-offs that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had pocketed in full knowledge that enough Republicans who actually supported its provisions would end up supporting the bill, risking fallout to themselves and their own party in the process.
As reported by Aaron Blake, writing for The Washington Post:
The reaction from the vast majority of House Republicans was as predicable as it was vehement; Florida Man Rep. Matt Gaetz was no exception.
Others, such as Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, called the 13 Republican defectors “traitors” to their party. Rep. Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina declared that he would “primary the hell” out of anyone who voted for the infrastructure legislation. It’s not entirely clear how Cawthorn would carry out his threat, but since many of the defectors—such as Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania—occupy moderate “swing” districts, Democrats are doubtlessly applauding Cawthorn’s stated intentions.
The final vote also proved an embarrassment to House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who had confidently predicted last week that he expected very few Republicans to vote for it, and that it would most certainly “fail” as a result. Blake quotes the right-wing National Review, which excoriated those Republicans for their “betrayal,” and accused them of “rescu[ing] Biden’s failed agenda.” That publication also suggested that the Republican caucus consider ousting McCarthy for his failure to keep his colleagues in line.
Meanwhile, the Squad can relax in the knowledge that each of its members voted exactly the way they always said they would. It’s not that they didn’t trust President Biden or Speaker Pelosi. It’s the simple fact that the understanding all along was that both infrastructure bills—the so-called “bipartisan” bill as well as the Build Back Better (BBB) bill—were always conceived as being executed in tandem, in order to prevent certain Democratic senators from backing out of the reconciliation package. This suspicion was amply confirmed early on by two Senate Democrats, Joe “Maserati” Manchin and his corporate sidekick, Kyrsten Sinema, both of whom broke faith with the original agreement (with Manchin in particular insisting that the bipartisan bill be voted on first and separately). After months of moving the goalposts at regular intervals, neither of those two erstwhile Democrats has ever committed themselves to the broader “human infrastructure” package, and there is legitimate speculation that both may still abandon it altogether.
Ultimately, with Pelosi’s help, the Squad members are the ones who stood on principle, honoring the original agreement and doing exactly what they’d spent months telling their constituents they would do. They succeeded in bringing 13 Republicans under fire from the rest of the GOP caucus, while carefully allowing enough votes from the rest of the Progressive Caucus for the BiF to pass. In fact, one Republican House member who voted for the BiF expressly said she did it in order to see the Squad “sidelined:”
Uh-huh. Meanwhile, President Biden has a huge win, and the GOP is going berserk at its own membership. If Manchin and Sinema continue to betray the Democrats on BBB, those six Squad members are going to look mighty prescient, and if the two conserva-Dems actually decide to come on board, the House has already extracted commitments from enough members to vote for BBB after the Congressional Budget Office scoring. If anything, the Squad should be getting high fives rather than criticism from the rest of the Democratic caucus.
It was very, very well played.
I admit it’s almost impossible to fathom what these folks could possibly have in common that might raise the blood pressure of the average Fox News viewer, but after much deliberation I’ve tentatively concluded it must be their fiendish political skills. As it turns out, their refusal to vote for the “socialist” (BiF) bill on principle has apparently driven the remainder of the GOP caucus over the edge with apoplexy. Because by withholding their votes in a display of unison, they helped lure in 13 GOP House members to vote for the bill, rescuing the beleaguered Democratic president from floundering in the eyes of the American public.
In their rush to condemn the now-expanded Squad for its apparent apostasy in failing to support the bipartisan bill, many Democrats apparently overlooked a subtle but unmistakable consequence: The votes were obvious trade-offs that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had pocketed in full knowledge that enough Republicans who actually supported its provisions would end up supporting the bill, risking fallout to themselves and their own party in the process.
As reported by Aaron Blake, writing for The Washington Post:
The reaction from the vast majority of House Republicans was as predicable as it was vehement; Florida Man Rep. Matt Gaetz was no exception.
Others, such as Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, called the 13 Republican defectors “traitors” to their party. Rep. Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina declared that he would “primary the hell” out of anyone who voted for the infrastructure legislation. It’s not entirely clear how Cawthorn would carry out his threat, but since many of the defectors—such as Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania—occupy moderate “swing” districts, Democrats are doubtlessly applauding Cawthorn’s stated intentions.
The final vote also proved an embarrassment to House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who had confidently predicted last week that he expected very few Republicans to vote for it, and that it would most certainly “fail” as a result. Blake quotes the right-wing National Review, which excoriated those Republicans for their “betrayal,” and accused them of “rescu[ing] Biden’s failed agenda.” That publication also suggested that the Republican caucus consider ousting McCarthy for his failure to keep his colleagues in line.
Meanwhile, the Squad can relax in the knowledge that each of its members voted exactly the way they always said they would. It’s not that they didn’t trust President Biden or Speaker Pelosi. It’s the simple fact that the understanding all along was that both infrastructure bills—the so-called “bipartisan” bill as well as the Build Back Better (BBB) bill—were always conceived as being executed in tandem, in order to prevent certain Democratic senators from backing out of the reconciliation package. This suspicion was amply confirmed early on by two Senate Democrats, Joe “Maserati” Manchin and his corporate sidekick, Kyrsten Sinema, both of whom broke faith with the original agreement (with Manchin in particular insisting that the bipartisan bill be voted on first and separately). After months of moving the goalposts at regular intervals, neither of those two erstwhile Democrats has ever committed themselves to the broader “human infrastructure” package, and there is legitimate speculation that both may still abandon it altogether.
Ultimately, with Pelosi’s help, the Squad members are the ones who stood on principle, honoring the original agreement and doing exactly what they’d spent months telling their constituents they would do. They succeeded in bringing 13 Republicans under fire from the rest of the GOP caucus, while carefully allowing enough votes from the rest of the Progressive Caucus for the BiF to pass. In fact, one Republican House member who voted for the BiF expressly said she did it in order to see the Squad “sidelined:”
Uh-huh. Meanwhile, President Biden has a huge win, and the GOP is going berserk at its own membership. If Manchin and Sinema continue to betray the Democrats on BBB, those six Squad members are going to look mighty prescient, and if the two conserva-Dems actually decide to come on board, the House has already extracted commitments from enough members to vote for BBB after the Congressional Budget Office scoring. If anything, the Squad should be getting high fives rather than criticism from the rest of the Democratic caucus.
It was very, very well played.