How Biden Can Recover From His Summer Slide - Seib
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Take back control of messaging from his party’s progressive wing.
Let’s assume Democrats, in coming weeks, end up with the most modest likely outcome of their push for domestic spending: a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill coupled with a $1.9 trillion version of Mr. Biden’s “Build Back Better” social welfare and climate change proposal. Stack those atop the $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief and stimulus plan Mr. Biden signed in March, and you would end up with almost $5 trillion in new spending approved this year... Yet progressives are portraying that potential outcome as something of a disaster, the result of a cruel set of “cuts” at the hands of Democratic moderates. It would, in fact, amount to perhaps the most significant one-year increase in spending on domestic programs since the Great Depression, something Mr. Biden might point out more forcefully to his critics on the left.
Get back in front of the Covid-19 problem.
In the intramural warfare over legislation that consumes Washington, it’s easy to forget how much Mr. Biden’s electoral victory in 2020 turned on a sense that he would do a better job handling the coronavirus than did former President Donald Trump. He was on his way to vindicating that sentiment until the summertime Delta variant turned the trend line from success to resurgence, bringing along a renewal of bitter fights over masks, social distancing and school openings.
Now, the spread of vaccines may be pushing the trend line back into positive territory. Employer vaccine mandates, pushed by Mr. Biden amid some controversy, appear to be driving up vaccine rates in a way that cajoling from public health officials wasn’t. Making schools safe and free from virus controversies is the next, and perhaps final, big hurdle. Mr. Biden has to create a sense that he has gotten in front of that problem.
Use the opportunities just ahead to re-establish competence on the world stage.
A coming meeting of the Group of 20 industrialized nations, a virtual summit meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, a global conference on climate change: All represent a chance for Mr. Biden to not only lead, but to explain to voters why he considered it important to put the fight in Afghanistan behind, to focus on some bigger problems ahead.
Establish control of the immigration crisis.
Democrats probably underestimate the damage being done to them by the series of migrant surges at the southern border this year. We’ve learned that no president—in fact, no world leader—can fully control the movement of migrants today. What they can do is show that they have a comprehensive plan to reduce the flow at the source, handle it more smoothly at the border and ensure a more orderly processing of the arrivals.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-biden-can-recover-from-his-summer-slide-11633958076 (subscription)
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