
Biden faces a reckoning on his agenda as top aides start to temper expectations
CNN
President Joe Biden faced a reckoning Thursday as his aides began to tamp down expectations for quick passage of his sweeping domestic agenda after efforts to broker compromise between warring factions of his party appeared to fall short.
A failed or delayed vote on a bipartisan infrastructure package in the House Thursday would not mean the end of Biden's quest to fundamentally change the country's social safety net and reorient its tax code. But it would prove a major political setback for a President who ran on his experience as a master dealmaker and convener of the disparate wings of the Democratic Party.
It was certain to cause more grumbling among Democrats, not only directed toward the two Senate moderates who appear to hold singular power over the entire legislative process, but also at Biden, who has been unwilling so far to wage a public pressure campaign on those senators to see his agenda passed.