Given that there aren't the votes to get a bill past a filibuster, and there aren't the votes to eliminate the filibuster, what, exactly should Biden - or "the Democrats" - do?
I assume, based on news reports, that "the Democrats" have attempted to bring the holdouts around, and the holdouts are standing fast. Should someone kidnap Joe Manchin's wife and/or children until he agrees to come around?
Unless there is something that can actually be done to change things, then any "fight" by Biden (or "the Democrats") will end up failing, while calling attention to their weakness.
"I assume, based on news reports, that 'the Democrats' have attempted to bring the holdouts around, and the holdouts are standing fast." We actually don't know that. It's unclear from the reporting how much a priority voting rights is, compared to say the economic agenda. There's reason to believe the White House has given priority to the economic agenda and has focused arm twisting Manchin on that. There's good political reason to do so! But also, as this post notes, risks.
This is really gut more than anything, but based on the language from Biden/Harris and the sense that Feinstein gave away the game earlier this year, I suspect the White House is going to try to wait this out. Even more cynically, the strategy could be to hold off on action on voting rights until after the midterms. I don't feel like I have a good understanding of what Biden wants to, but at the end of the day I suspect that the desire to be remembered as a transformational president will push him to support some kind of action on voting rights and filibuster reform over this natural inclination to do nothing.
Given that there aren't the votes to get a bill past a filibuster, and there aren't the votes to eliminate the filibuster, what, exactly should Biden - or "the Democrats" - do?
I assume, based on news reports, that "the Democrats" have attempted to bring the holdouts around, and the holdouts are standing fast. Should someone kidnap Joe Manchin's wife and/or children until he agrees to come around?
Unless there is something that can actually be done to change things, then any "fight" by Biden (or "the Democrats") will end up failing, while calling attention to their weakness.
"I assume, based on news reports, that 'the Democrats' have attempted to bring the holdouts around, and the holdouts are standing fast." We actually don't know that. It's unclear from the reporting how much a priority voting rights is, compared to say the economic agenda. There's reason to believe the White House has given priority to the economic agenda and has focused arm twisting Manchin on that. There's good political reason to do so! But also, as this post notes, risks.
This is really gut more than anything, but based on the language from Biden/Harris and the sense that Feinstein gave away the game earlier this year, I suspect the White House is going to try to wait this out. Even more cynically, the strategy could be to hold off on action on voting rights until after the midterms. I don't feel like I have a good understanding of what Biden wants to, but at the end of the day I suspect that the desire to be remembered as a transformational president will push him to support some kind of action on voting rights and filibuster reform over this natural inclination to do nothing.