(#4653) House progressives are correct not to trust manchinema

      When you are Lucy and holding the football for Charlie Brown to kick, it would be wise not to try and kick the football with Lucy holding it. Why? Because she always moves the ball before Charlie's foot can kick it. This is the same rationale with manchinema. Yesterday the House progressives were asked to give up their leverage on the manchinema without any concrete assurance that the manchinema would hold up their end of the bargain. How did we get here? Well the manchinema agreed and voted to pass a 3.5 trillion dollar human infrastructure bill the House sent them a couple of months ago. With the agreement that if the House passed the hard infrastructure bill the human infrastructure bill would be passed as well.
     Since then the manchinema has held the human infrastructure bill that returned to them for another vote hostage by either refusing to acknowledge they would vote for it, meanwhile whittling it down to it's current 1.75 trillion price tag. So not only has the human infrastructure bill been depleted it is still not settled with the manchinema that it has their votes. Meanwhile the manchinema expect that the hard infrastructure bill they sponsored and has not been altered one iota, should be passed into law immediately by the House. Which won't happen now until the backstabbing manchinema agree or vote for the human infrastructure bill thanks to progressives standing their ground.
     I know we need to get both these bills passed into law but the onus has always been on the manchinema and those who are decrying progressives for stopping the hard infrastructure bill are just missing the point or are disingenuous. If it isn't clear to all that the manchinema would kill the human infrastructure bill if the hard infrastructure bill is voted on then I have a bridge to sell you. The only way to get the manchinema to vote and pass the human infrastructure bill is to wait to pass the hard infrastructure bill, period! So put the pressure on the manchinema to uphold their part of the bargain and quit laying blame on progressives who are just defending President Biden's agenda!