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On February 27, the House passed Biden’s $1.9 trillion rescue bill, including the provision that raised the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025. The vote was narrow, 219 to 212, without one Republican yes.
Speaker Pelosi told others she saw what Democrats were doing in biblical terms.
“I see this as the gospel of Matthew. When I was hungry, you fed me,” she said. “When I was homeless, you gave me shelter.”
The Senate parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, had ruled days earlier that legislation raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour violated the rules for reconciliation and could not be included in the rescue bill.
While Biden had supported a $15 an hour minimum wage during the 2020 campaign, he and his top aides were not eager to go to war against the parliamentarian. But Pelosi knew that her members wanted it, so she kept it in. Senate Democrats would have to strip it out.
Keeping it in was also a blunt reminder to Senate Democrats: The House Democratic conference is more liberal than you. Don’t forget it. Anything you do to water down this legislation could threaten its fate once it comes back for a final vote in the House.
Ron Klain kept small notecards in his jacket pocket. They had everything on them, in small print. The president’s schedule, to-do lists, agenda for the White House staff, phone calls to be made.
In late February, one item at the top was winning over moderate Senate Democrats on Biden’s rescue plan.
Klain had lots of meetings and talks with those lawmakers. He was astonished to find what he called a “complete inversion in American politics.” Bernie Sanders and progressive allies wanted to make sure the stimulus checks went to people making six figures—$100,000—or more. Moderates, in contrast, were saying no, no, no, the money should be directed more to poor people.
They finally reached a compromise. Couples making $150,000 could get the full check, but a partial check would go to those making up to $200,000 with a sharper phasing out.
Manchin and about seven other Democrats had voiced some disagreement with aspects of the rescue plan. Klain and the White House staff were tracking the objections closely, from major concerns to small gripes. In a 50-50 Senate, each Democrat was a tall pole in the tent. Everyone was needed.
Klain recalled that they all thought that life in the Obama White House had been hard with 58 Democratic senators. He fantasized that if Biden had 58 Democrats, as chief of staff Klain would only have to work three days a week.
As Senate Democrats negotiated their version of Biden’s plan, Senator Mark Warner, Democrat of Virginia, and others pushed for more money to expand broadband programs in rural areas where coverage was scarce. More than $3 billion had already been allocated in December’s spending bill for broadband programs to expand Internet service, a sum considered huge.
But Warner and the others were pushing for more, citing how the pandemic had changed Americans’ lives and made high-speed Internet access essential for health care, distance learning, and working from home.
The Biden White House agreed to increase the total amount of broadband spending for fiscal year 2021 to $20 billion.
At first, Warner and others thought that meant the White House would add $20 billion on top of the $3 billion enacted late last year for $23 billion total.
“You people are a little short,” Warner said in a Zoom call soon after. “You said you would add $20 billion.” It was evident that the rescue bill was becoming a goodie package for Democrats.
Steve Ricchetti and Warner had a little blow-out over this, and Ricchetti stuck to the $20 billion total for 2021. Warner and his allies ultimately agreed and secured an additional $17 billion in broadband spending.
It was a major commitment, the largest federal broadband investment ever.
The private spat among Democrats illustrated the large amounts of money at stake and how everyone wanted the most for their pet programs. The feeding frenzy was real.
While on the sidelines of the rescue plan, McConnell and Graham met regularly. The main topic continued to be Trump and what role the former president should play in positioning the party to win in 2022.
Graham said Trump was still the dominant force in the party. His 74 million votes still resonated, and his following was loyal and strong.
McConnell considered Graham the “Trump whisperer.” He was fine with Graham playing the role. But he did not buy into Graham’s strategy. McConnell said he saw Trump as a fading brand. Retired. “OTTB” as they say in Kentucky—“off-the-track Thoroughbred.”
“There is a clear trend moving,” McConnell said, toward a place where the Republican Party is not dominated by Trump. “Sucking up to Donald Trump is not a strategy that works.”
McConnell reminded Graham he had seen this dynamic play out before in 2014. That year, establishment Republicans beat back wild Tea Party challengers like Christine O’Donnell in Delaware. Many Republicans had warned him then the Tea Party was going to swallow the GOP whole, win every race.
Instead, Republicans maintained control of the House, gaining 13 seats, giving them the largest majority since 1929. In the Senate they won back control and gained nine seats, the biggest gain since Reagan’s year of 1980.
And 2022 could end up being a lot like 2014, McConnell said. Republicans could hold firm and support normal, not crazy. Focus on electability, intervene in primaries when needed.
McConnell was confident his preferred candidates could eventually outpace any ragtag network that Trump might try to assemble. McConnell and his crew would out-organize them, out-fundraise them, and avoid theatrical clashes.
“The only place I can see Trump and me actually at loggerheads would be if he gets behind some clown who clearly can’t win,” McConnell said sharply. “To have a chance of getting the Senate back, you have to have the most electable candidates possible.”
It had to be about winning. If Trump was useful, great. If he were not useful, they would oppose his picks. Strictly business, McConnell said.
If Democrats tried to use McConnell as a cudgel against Republicans, he was confident it would fail as a tactic, even if they played his condemnation on February 13, when he said Trump was morally responsible.
“I’m not enough of a villain,” he said, at least in the GOP, “to make that work.”
Trump was going to try anyway.