Joe Biden urges Congress to “move forward” on reforms after election slap

According to him, the Democrats’ difficulties in several polls on Tuesday are mainly due to the inaction of Congress. Joe Biden on Wednesday urged Democrats to “move forward” and vote his major reform projects blocked by internal dissension, in the aftermath of the resounding defeat of his party’s candidate for the election of governor of Virginia, a poll seen as a test of its popularity.

“No governor of Virginia has ever won by being from the same party as the current president,” he told reporters, refusing to take responsibility for this failure, which is considered a pivotal moment in his presidency. “I know people want things done and that’s why I keep pushing very hard for the Democratic Party to move forward and vote” on its plans, one for infrastructure modernization and the other for social spending and climate, which are the subject of intense negotiations in his party, explained Joe Biden, who returned on the night of his European tour for the G20 and the COP26.

New Jersey recount in sight after Democrat’s narrow victory

A year before the crucial midterm elections which could completely reshuffle the cards of power, Tuesday’s defeat in Virginia sounds like a stinging failure for Joe Biden, who campaigned alongside Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe. “A tough night for the Democrats,” J. Miles Coleman, of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, told AFP.

Republicans could see Glenn Youngkin’s victory as a possible strategic roadmap for 2022, and perhaps even the 2024 presidential election: this newbie in politics has managed to retain the Trumpist electoral base while distancing enough from it. ex-president to win back votes in the affluent suburbs.

Another worrying sign for Joe Biden, the outgoing Democratic governor of New Jersey was neck and neck Wednesday with his Republican rival. Phil Murphy was however given largely the winner in the polls preceding the election. The AP agency projected the Democrat’s victory on Wednesday night, but with a gap of 24,000 votes (which should widen, however), the Republican candidate could ask for a recount and has already dispatched lawyers to the scene.

The American president, whose popularity rating has reached an all-time low at this level of mandate in recent political history, with the exception of Donald Trump, must now return to Washington in the throes of Congress, since his two gigantic plans investments are the subject of interminable negotiations in its own camp between progressives and moderates.

The Joe Manchin Key

An agreement on his “Build Back Better” program of social and climate reforms would represent a major personal victory. Alas, the overall bill for this plan, already halved to $ 1.750 billion, is being contested mainly by moderate senator Joe Manchin, elected from the traditionally conservative state of West Virginia, and who has virtually a veto right to the government. Congress in view of the very thin Democratic majority.

“I can not go home and justify (these spending programs), I can not vote for,” he said Monday, referring to the impact of these plans on public debt and inflation. “The political quarrels must end,” he added, referring to the blockade imposed by the progressive democrats on the infrastructure component.

This $ 1.2 trillion program is to renovate the country’s dilapidated roads, bridges and transportation, and is supported by Democrats and some Republicans. Approved by the Senate in August, the project has since been blocked in the House of Representatives by elected officials from the left wing who demand to vote at the same time for the “Build Back Better” project. They fear that the centrists will refuse to support this very expensive project after getting the check for infrastructure.