Out of Capital
It’s a pretty big risk…a president making a trip to the U.S. Capitol building to meet with members of his party to urge them to take action on a piece of legislation.
Yet there Joe Biden was once again yesterday, caucusing with Senate Democrats and urging them to break Senate rules to unconstitutionally federalize elections. It’s not the first time he did this in only one year in office. The last time, it was to urge support for his massive spending initiative; it failed. And it’s pretty clear this one will fail, as well; Biden admitted as much when asked about it by reporters after the meeting.
To further show just how little political capital he has, even within his own party, one Democrat senator took to the floor of the chamber to announce she was strongly against the scheme to change Senate rules…and that was before the sales pitch.
Biden’s career was in the U.S. Senate. That experience and the relationships he built were helpful during the Obama Administration. Recall one New Year’s Eve as Biden went to the capital to avoid a government shutdown as the new year 2013 began, with late night arm-twisting and deal-making.
But that was nearly a decade ago. Democrats only have a tie-break majority in the chamber, and Biden himself hasn’t served in the Senate for 13 years…more than two Senate terms…meaning he doesn’t have the one-on-one relationship with colleagues he used to.
By all rights, his vice president should be able to step in and fill the role…but she’s so unpopular that’s a non-starter. And this is not the same Biden politically who served there for four decades.
Again, you know it’s on shaky ground when the president himself travels to meet with lawmakers. Going forward, if he tries again, I wonder how many will claim a scheduling conflict similar to the snub he experienced in Georgia earlier this week.
