How Democrats Got Desperate

The progressives blinked.

For months, the feisty left flank of the House Democratic Caucus insisted it would not provide the votes to pass President Joe Biden’s $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package until the Senate first approved the rest of the president’s economic agenda. At minimum, progressives said, all 50 Senate Democrats—and especially the chamber’s two most centrist members, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona—would have to at least commit to Biden’s “Build Back Better” plan. Twice the House liberals backed up their tough talk with action (or more precisely, inaction) by rebuffing Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s bid to vote on the infrastructure bill.

Then the off-year voters had their say. Three days after Republicans Democrats in Virginia and nearly toppled them in New Jersey, the progressives released the legislative hostage they had held captive for three