Plot twist: AOC takes on Biden
Will she and progressives stand strong against debt ceiling compromises?
In yesterday’s Substack post, I took AOC, the Squad, and Bernie to task for caving too often to establishment Democrats. Then, of course, AOC goes ahead and very vocally warns Biden against making concessions to the GOP over raising the debt ceiling. Which is a great thing — and something we definitely need more of from the Squad.
I included in my post a video of TYT clips (which as of writing has 91 likes and 791 views, not bad for my second Tiktok video ever!) where Cenk and Ana said essentially what I had been saying in a tweet thread a week before. We want to have progressive lawmakers’ backs, and we need to praise them when they do take strong action against the establishment, but we need to call them out when they are too hesitant to take on corporate Dems head-on in the press on key issues.
The big news is that AOC, and several other progressive lawmakers, did just that — they spoke to Axios and said in clearly and forcefully that Biden should stop entertaining so-called compromises to encourage the GOP to raise the debt ceiling, like spending caps on social programs and allowing more oil drilling.
AOC told Axios (via Yahoo News)
The White House can “expect pushback on nearly any significant concession […] It’s profoundly destructive.”
Pramila Jayapal (who as Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair has let progressive down before) uses even stronger terms
“If they give on these core Democratic values, there will be a huge backlash […] at the voting booth.”
Jamaal Bowman, on a more somber note, said
“It makes us look weak […] I'm very, very concerned [and] not optimistic in terms of what we're going to give up.”
A number of constitutional experts and several Congress members — including my own Representative, Steve Cohen from TN as well as Jamie Raskin from Maryland — are saying Biden could raise the debt ceiling on his own, invoking the 14th Amendment. And that’s if the GOP is stupid enough to cause a worldwide economic collapse by not voting to raise the debt limit. There’s no reason to give essentially free gifts to the GOP, which arguably are items that some if not many corporate Democrats would be fine with anyway (*cough* Joe Manchin *cough*).
This sort of thing is EXACTLY what we need progressives in Washington to do — take a horrible idea from corrupt establishment Democrats (capping or cutting social programs as nearly unilateral surrender to the GOP), publicly call them out for it by name (Biden specifically), and offer a clear alternative (invoking the 14th Amendment or forcing the GOP to just vote to avoid the economic and electoral aftermath of not raising the debt ceiling).
Kudos when kudos is due. Now they need to hold the line and not let establishment Dems convince them to give in to these or similar concessions in the name of party unity or to save the country — that’s in Biden’s and the GOP’s hands, and doesn’t have to involve We the People getting the short end of the stick as usual.