The journey of the Biden administration's Build Back Better plan to actually passing into law is looking suspiciously like the fight over Obamacare in 2008. Both Obama and Biden mostly left the drafting of the legislation to their congressional allies, the former also encouraged a bipartisan approach to the health care bill.
The ACA was compromised nearly to death to satisfy Republicans who voted against it anyway. This time around, the BBB legislation looks like it will be watered down to please Democrats Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema. Biden's bill may come through the process more intact than Obama's, but the dilatory process and the Democrats' infighting may spell doom for the party in the 2022 midterms, just as it happened in 2010.
I don't think voters are turned off by legislative sausage making, especially if the final product has a positive impact on their lives. In the case of Obamacare, many, if not most of the bill's provisions were set to kick in over a number of years. This diluted public support at a crucial time for Democrats. Hopefully the party learned its lesson and will have the benefits of the BBB flowing to voters in the run up to next year's elections.
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