In Georgia, Biden's presidency meets early defining moment

Usually it's a president's first midterm election that reorders a White House's political approach and priorities. For President-elect Joe Biden, his most defining congressional election is coming before he takes office.

Two ruffs Tuesday in Georgia will decide which party controls Senate and, thus, how far new president can reach legislatively on issues such as pandemic, health care, taxation, energy and environment. For a politician who sold himself to Americans as a uniter and a seasoned legislative broker, Georgia elections will help determine wher he's able to live up to his billing.

“It’s t that you can’t get anything done in mirity or get everything done in majority, but having gavel, having that leership control can be difference in success or failure for an ministration,” said Jim Manley, once a top aide to former Democratic Senate Leer Harry Reid, who held his post opposite current Senate Majority Leer Mitch McConnell.

Both Georgia Democrats Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warck must win Tuesday to split Senate 50-50. Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, as president of Senate, would provide tiebreaker needed to determine control.

To be sure, even a closely divided Democratic Senate wouldn’t give Biden everything he wants. Senate rules still require 60 votes to vance most major legislation; for w, re aren't eugh Democrats willing to change that requirement. So, regardless of Georgia's results, Biden will have to win over Republicans in a Senate where a bipartisan group of more centrist senators stand to see ir stock rise.

A Democratic Senate still would clear an easier path for Biden’s minees to key posts, especially on federal judiciary, and give Democrats control of committees and much of floor action. Conversely, a Senate led by McConnell almost certainly would deny Biden major legislative victories, as it did late in President Barack Obama’s tenure, by keeping his nda from even getting up-or-down votes.

Biden's team is keenly aware of stakes. president-elect will travel to Atlanta on Monday, eve of ruffs, to campaign with Ossoff and Warck for second time in three weeks. Biden’s campaign aides have helped raise millions to boost party infrastructure that helped Biden become first Democratic presidential minee since 1992 to carry state. Vice President-elect Kamala Harris will campaign Sunday in Savannah.

In his last visit, Biden called Republican Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler “roblocks” and urged Georgians “to vote for two United States senators who kw how to say word ‘yes’ and t just ‘.’”

Congressional makeup shapes any ministration, but perhaps even more so for Biden, who spent 36 years in Senate, plus eight as Obama’s vice president and top congressional liaison. Biden leaned on that resume to pitch himself to country as a consensus builder; he also criticized presidents' increased use of executive action to go around Congress and insisted it would be different in his presidency.

Even some Republicans are hopeful. Michael Steel, once a top viser to Republican House Speaker John Boehner, a chief Obama foil along with McConnell, blamed Obama’s Capitol Hill troubles on his personal approach to his fellow politicians. Conversely, Steel said, “President-elect Biden is a legislator by avocation, by training, by instinct, by experience in a way that former President Obama was t.”

Steel predicted Biden and McConnell, two former colleagues, can find “common ground” on infrastructure and immigration — policy areas that have stumped multiple ministrations. Steel ted a handful of Republican senators, including Marco Rubio of Florida and Rob Portman of Ohio, could face tough reelection fights in 2022, potentially making m er to cut deals y could tout in campaigns.

Still, re's indication McConnell would allow consideration of or top Biden priorities, most tably a “public option” expansion of 2010 Affordable Care Act, which passed without a single Republican vote when Democrats controlled both chambers on Capitol Hill. Biden's proposed tax hikes on corporations and wealthiest Americans also are likely de in a GOP Senate.

Biden will need his negotiating skills to navigate left flank of his own party as well. While progressives say y've lowered ir expectations of what's possible — even under a Democratic Senate — y still intend to push Biden.

Larry Cohen, chairman of Our Revolution, offshoot of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders' 2016 presidential bid, said progressives will press Democrats in Congress to use "budget reconciliation” process to work around Senate's 60-vote filibuster threshold. Cohen argued that tactic might be used to accomplish long-sought goals like ending tax subsidies to fossil fuel companies and enabling Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to negotiate as a single customer with pharmaceutical companies.

Those moves, Cohen ted, could generate considerable savings, creating new revenue even if Republicans won’t agree to any tax increases.

He also said progressives will push Biden to use executive authority. He named two initiatives Biden has called for publicly: ending new drilling on federal lands and raising minimum w for federal contractors to $15 per hour, even if Congress won’t set that floor across ecomy. Ar progressive priority, cancelling student debt under federal loan programs, is something Biden has t said wher he’d be willing to attempt unilaterally.

Democrats’ limited expectations about ir own power, even with a potential majority, belie exaggerated claims Republicans have used in Georgia races.

In Perdue’s and Loeffler’s telling, a Democratic Senate would “rubber stamp” a “socialist nda,” from “ending private insurance” and “expanding Supreme Court” to opting wholesale a “Green New Deal” that would spend trillions and raise taxes on every U.S. household by thousands of dollars each year. Besides misrepresenting Biden’s and most Democratic senators’ policy preferences, that characterization igres reality of Senate’s roster.

At one campaign stop this week, Ossoff said Perdue’s “ridiculous” attacks “blow my mind.” He scoffed at claim that his policy ideas, which align closely with Biden, amount to a leftist lunge. But challenger agreed with incumbent on how much Georgia ruffs matter.

“We have too much good work to do,” Ossoff said, “to be mired in gridlock and obstruction for next few years.”

Im credits: AP