President Joe Biden reiterated his vow not to borrow to pay for his new infrastructure package Thursday, insisting the estimated $4 trillion package will be financed with revenue and not debt.
“I’m going to meet with Republicans next week when they come back and seriously meet with them. I’m willing to compromise,” Biden said, speaking from the White House State Dining Room. “But I’m not willing to not pay for what we’re talking about.”
“I’m not willing to deficit spend,” he added.
And in a swipe at the Republican administration before him, Biden said: “They already have us $2 trillion in the hole.”
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Biden was asked the question after remarks on Wednesday about the coronavirus spending plan he signed into law soon after taking office, which relied on deficit spending.
The White House is now selling twin infrastructure and jobs proposals, negotiating with lawmakers on Capitol Hill over plans that, together, are estimated to cost about $4 trillion.
Biden said his plans won’t increase the deficit by a “single penny” as concern rises about annual deficits that have ballooned to a cumulative $28 trillion national debt.
“He is sensitive to concerns from a lot of the moderate Democrats that we have just spent, what was it, $3 trillion? And we didn’t pay for any of that,” said Michele Nellenbach, vice president of the Bipartisan Policy Center. “Now, he’s coming back with another $3 trillion, and at some point, we have to pay for stuff.”
In order to do this, Biden adjoined to his American Jobs and Families plans a companion bill that would hike taxes on corporations and on the very wealthy to pay for the infrastructure plan over 15 years, paying down deficits thereafter, according to the White House.
Over the traditional 10-year budget window, the plan would increase deficits by about $900 billion, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates.
Biden’s message attempts to thread a needle: While it appeals to centrist Democrats nervous about rapidly mounting costs, it sets up a potential conflict with other lawmakers he’ll need to back legislation in the evenly divided Senate.
Assuming the legislation draws no Republican votes, Biden will still need every Senate Democrat to get on board. Whether they will isn’t clear.
“I’m not a big pay-for guy,” said Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii. “I think some investments are worth deficit financing.”
“Nobody asks how we’re going to pay for the United States military,” Schatz said. “Nobody really asked how we were going to finance the tax cuts for the very wealthy. It’s only when it comes to progressive priorities that everybody freaks out and tries to find pay-fors.”
Democratic Sen. Jon Tester of Montana said a compromise pay-for could suffice.
“I think we should find a way to pay for half of it upfront, and then, hopefully with good infrastructure, it’ll create economic growth and pick up the other half,” he said.
But Biden’s pay-fors are proving popular outside the beltway, Democratic pollster John Anzalone said.
Instead of hiding from it, Anzalone said Biden should promote his plan to raise taxes on very wealthy people, billing it as an issue of “tax fairness.” Few things are as broadly popular as raising taxes on businesses and on people earning more than $400,000 a year, Anzalone told Axios last month.
It’s also a message with pull beyond the beltway, as Biden takes his pitch on the road, with Biden telling voters in deep-red Louisiana on Thursday, “I’m not a deficit spender.”
“There is an interest in the Democratic Party in undoing some of those tax cuts. And if you can make this a story outside of D.C. about corporate tax cuts or infrastructure, you’re probably going to win on infrastructure,” Nellenbach said.
“The public is going to say, ‘Well, sure, raise taxes on corporations to provide infrastructure.’ I think that’s a winning argument for him outside of D.C.,” she added.
Still, in asking Congress to pay for his bill, Biden has drawn ire from both sides of the aisle.
“I don’t think there will be any Republican support,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said Monday in Louisville. “None. Zero.”
For Republicans, rolling back much of the 2017 Tax Cut and Jobs Act, a signature reform bill signed into law by former President Donald Trump, as Biden wants to do, is a nonstarter.
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McConnell this week said he is “100%” focused on stopping Biden’s agenda, before adding an addendum to this Thursday: “I’m anxious to stop the Biden agenda, depending on what it is.”
