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Humoring Joe Manchin any further would be a colossal mistake.
In the end, having to negotiate with a coal baron on transitioning away from fossil fuels was not the most reliable option.
As you and the rest of the world know by now, Joe Manchin walked away from adding climate measures or tax increases to any party-line reconciliation package. What was once a transformative, multitrillion-dollar agenda to face numerous long-standing crises in domestic policy has narrowed to an exceptionally narrow drug price reform, the main part of which—price negotiation in Medicare—doesn’t kick in until 2026, two years after the next presidential election, and a two-year extension on ACA subsidies that were set to expire at the end of the year. Eighteen months of fruitless negotiation has come down to that.
There’s going to be a ton to say about this in the coming days, and we’re certainly going to say it. We’re going to note that progressives who said that the social-spending and infrastructure plans had to be tied together or else the social spending wouldn’t happen were proven entirely correct. We’re going to reinforce that Manchin was never a viable partner in this enterprise, something that we’ve known for at least this entire year. We’re going to note that the Trump tax cuts—opposed unanimously by every Democrat in or out of Congress—are now looking incredibly likely to become permanent, without much of a fight. We’re going to try and draw lessons out of the policy and governance structures of the Democratic Party that led to this utter failure. We’re going to once again highlight, as we have for three years, the importance of executive action as the main path forward for progress in Washington. (The states are a different matter, and we’ll talk about that, too.)
But first things first. Staring us in the face is this health policy bill that by all accounts has the support of all 50 Democratic senators. That should be passed the moment that those 50 senators are physically available to cast a vote in the chamber.
Manchin made a play at walking back his comments on local radio today, saying that climate measures weren’t dead, that he just wants to see one more inflation report, just one more set of data, before coming back and hammering something out in September. Humoring him would be a colossal mistake. Manchin has shown the world who he is; Chuck Schumer spending one more second in a room with him would be absurd. If he wants to go down in history as the man responsible for the diminishment of life on Earth, that’s between him and his network of coal companies.
What we’re left with on the table isn’t great, but it is, and this is a low bar, a lot better than nothing. The drug price reform is narrow and pinched and limited mostly to seniors and it still saves nearly $300 billion in Medicare costs, plus a lot more for individual patients. Extending the ACA subsidies prevents the self-own October surprise of a spike in insurance premiums. Yes, a two-year extension sets up the same brinkmanship and potential premium spike before the presidential election, but Republicans will share some of the blame for that if they control the House and/or Senate, and a presidential race could be a better stage for highlighting that issue.
Most important, stopping the will-they-or-won’t-they is an absolute political imperative. The party is exhausted by failure, and won’t hold out for another couple months of wishes and hopes. Eighteen months of Joe Manchin being America’s most well-known Democrat is enough. Just put the bill on the floor and get this over with. Get something completed, and spend the August recess thinking about how we got here.
