Still dead: Biden keeps pushing Build Back Better despite lack of bill

But how any of that will happen remains to be seen.

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With the original legislation from last year dead, no solid details are available about what will be in any future iteration of the bill or how those plans will accomplish the administration’s goals.

Biden’s persistence has drawn the ire of conservatives.

“After Spanish dictator Francisco Franco died in 1975, Saturday Night Live’s Weekend Update had a recurring joke in which, week after week, anchor Chevy Chase pronounced to the audience that ‘Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead,'” said Jenny Beth Martin, honorary chairwoman of Tea Party Patriots Action. “With a nod to SNL, our message to President Biden is that no matter how much you may wish it were still clinging to life, your BBB Act is still dead.”

Manchin effectively killed the Build Back Better Act in December by coming out against it and reiterated earlier this month that “there are no organized conversations going on” regarding the bill. If there were, he said the tax code would have to be changed ahead of anything else and that he wanted bipartisan talks.

The West Virginia centrist’s stiff opposition prompted some in the media to predict that the BBB moniker would fade away, and some Democrats are even calling for a rebranding.

“That old name needs to go in the trash can,” Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz said last week. “I’m not very good at naming things or slogans, but Joe Manchin has been pretty clear he’s not voting for Build Back Better. So we need to work on something else.”

Despite the lack of details and continued rejections, Biden still refers to his agenda using the moniker, as have others within the White House, including press secretary Jen Psaki and first lady Jill Biden.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden has been working on a new proposal with some elements of the old Build Back Better bill that he thinks Manchin would support, and Majority Leader Chuck Schumer also says he’s continuing to have discussions about it.

A December statement from Wyden mentioned clean energy incentives tied to carbon emissions reductions, the child tax credit, and allowing Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices as possibilities. But a Wyden spokesperson said there is no time frame for when a new bill may emerge.

Left promoting a bill that doesn’t yet exist, Biden is now looking for a win on a smaller scale, argues onetime Democratic operative Sandy Maisel.

“He needs positive things coming out of his administration, and he hasn’t had very many yet,” said Maisel, a professor emeritus at Colby College. “He’s got the Supreme Court nomination, recent [positive] economic figures, and he doesn’t get as much credit as he deserves for the infrastructure bill and the earlier stuff he did in office. He needs more. I think he understands that, and that’s what he’s looking for.”

The original Build Back Better plan included over $2 trillion in spending, ranging from subsidized childcare to universal preschool, an extended child tax credit, and tax breaks for the purchase of electric vehicles. But any smaller version will still need to go through reconciliation, a budgetary tool that can only be used twice a year but allows legislation to pass with Democratic votes alone.

The White House has said it will get as much of the original plan as it possibly can with the 50 votes Democrats hold in the Senate.

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Regarding the name, Maisel says it has become a Biden trademark.

“It seems to me that he gets more credit if he passes a bill that has the name,” he said. “Build Back Better is his brand at this point.”