President Joe Biden’s second trip abroad is poorly timed for his domestic agenda and foreign policy, according to political insiders.
Biden’s work reestablishing the United States on the world stage after former President Donald Trump’s often-contentious relationship with international leaders has been further complicated by his inability to unite Democrats behind his partisan social welfare and climate spending package. The perception is Biden has gone overseas to convince other leaders to take environmental action without doing the same at home.
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The timing of Biden’s trip to Italy and the United Kingdom for the G-20 and United Nations climate summits, respectively, is not disastrous but not ideal, according to presidential historian David Greenberg.
“When it was planned, the White House surely expected the spending bills to be in the bag,” the Rutgers University professor said. “I don’t think his foreign audiences will pay too much attention to that, but domestically, it would look better if he were here to preside over the final agreements as they go through Congress.”
Biden traveled a shorter distance this week, driving up Pennsylvania Avenue between the White House and Congress to pitch his updated social welfare and climate spending package to House Democrats. The president delayed his flight out of the country to roll out a framework, revised down from $3.5 trillion to $1.75 trillion for centrist Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, in a last-ditch effort to pressure liberal Democrats to support it and the Senate-approved $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure deal. Far-left lawmakers have declined to back the latter as they seek concessions from Manchin and Sinema regarding the larger bill, set to be passed with the 50 senators who caucus with the party and Vice President Kamala Harris using the reconciliation process. Manchin and Sinema themselves only offered tepid endorsements of the framework.
But Biden’s in-person Capitol Hill appearance, the second in as many months, failed to convince liberal Democrats to trust him and their centrist colleagues concerning the social welfare and climate package and pass the infrastructure deal. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was similarly undermined by the endeavor. Centrist members had already complained to the Washington Examiner that internal leadership reforms and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s diminished influence had weakened Pelosi’s hold on her conference.
For Greenberg, that was the most important development: Biden, who prides himself on his deal-making skills and foreign policy expertise, was unable to close at home before heading abroad for more hard conversations. Among them, a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron on the sidelines of the G-20 in Rome after Macron temporarily recalled his ambassador to the U.S. last month over a new security alliance between America, the U.K., and Australia. The pact scuttled a diesel-electric submarine deal between France and Australia.
“What we are seeing is that it has been a long time since Joe Biden really knew the Senate,” Greenberg said. “Lyndon Johnson went straight from majority leader to vice president, straight from vice president to president. He kept his finger on the pulse of the Senate, and to some degree the House, the whole time. Biden clearly just doesn’t have that kind of game.”
Biden warned House Democrats his presidency and the vulnerable lawmakers’ political futures depended on passing his legislative priorities. Pelosi implored liberal lawmakers not to “embarrass” Biden by not clearing his infrastructure deal. Their entreaties fell on deaf ears. Pelosi had promised centrist Democrats she would bring the infrastructure measure to the floor last month.
Tom Cochran, a partner at public affairs firm 720 Strategies and a Barack Obama State Department alumnus, refused to believe liberal Democrats intended to embarrass Biden. He could not extend the same courtesy to those who oppose the president.
“Showing up in Glasgow without any climate action is deeply frustrating but par for the course, given the state of our Congress,” he said despite Democrats’ reliance on the reconciliation procedure. “It won’t be surprising to other world leaders, and I suspect they’ll be privately understanding, yet publicly share some level of admonishment which would be deserved and pointed toward the whole of our government.”
Cochran added: “The problem with being president is that you have to do everything all the time, while recognizing that you’ll fail or need to compromise down your solution to dilute your perceived successes.”
White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre defended Biden’s position heading into the international summits defeated en route to Europe.
“The president is coming into the G-20 and COP26 with strength. He’s been a leader since we stepped, he stepped into the White House from day one, and he’s going to continue,” she told reporters on Air Force One. “Within that legislation, if you look at climate change, an investment that we’ve never had before in this country: more than $500 billion.”
The Democratic National Committee has been trying to amplify that message too, sharing favorable polling of Biden’s global standing, even after his botched troop withdrawal from Afghanistan.
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“American allies agree that President Biden is restoring our credibility and leadership on the world stage. Thanks to President Biden’s leadership, America is back,” the DNC said.
