President Joe Biden made a subtle dig at House Democrats refusing to work with their Republican colleagues after some GOP lawmakers voted not to certify select states’ 2020 electoral votes.
Biden cited his collaboration with the late North Carolina Republican Sen. Jesse Helms over funding the United Nations, despite Helms’s controversial views on race and homosexuality.
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“It’s too important for the American people for me not to continue to reach out to get things done with people I agree and disagree with,” Biden told MSNBC on Wednesday. “I ended up making a deal with Jesse Helms, for Lord’s sake, on funding United Nations.”
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He added, “If I had said because Jesse Helms has done all these other things, I’m never going to deal with him — it’s just not the way it works.”
Biden went on to say he believes in “redemption” for himself and others when asked whether a bipartisan agreement could be reached on his more than $4 trillion infrastructure-plus and social welfare plans after House Republicans voted Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney out of their leadership ranks for criticizing former President Donald Trump’s claim he won the 2020 election and his role in the Capitol riot.
“The Liz Cheney-McCarthy thing is above my paygrade. I mean, I have enough trouble figuring out my own party all the time, let alone Republicans,” Biden said.
Biden’s Helms anecdote chafes with the attitudes of many House Democrats as Congress continues to investigate the Jan. 6 attack on Capitol Hill by a pro-Trump mob.
Pennsylvania Democratic Rep. Madeleine Dean, for instance, failed this week to pass her bill regulating drugmaker marketing rights for rare disease therapies, a move that could help mitigate the opioid crisis. Dean encountered a mutiny of support after she would not permit Georgia Republican Rep. Buddy Carter to co-sign the legislation again following his objection to Pennsylvania’s Electoral College result.
Biden also defended his proposals’ broad infrastructure definition on Wednesday as negotiations with Congress come up against his self-imposed Memorial Day deadline.
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“I want to make it clear. I want to get a bipartisan deal on as much as we get a bipartisan deal on. And that means roads, bridges, broadband,” he said. “But I’m not giving up on the fact that we have, you know, 2 million women not able to go back to work because all the day care centers are closed.”
