We’ve been pushing for weeks to pass a version of President Biden’s Build Back Better Act with no cuts to climate, care, jobs or justice. Last week Sen Manchin and his Republican forced Biden to cut another ~$1.5 trillion from the bill, but there’s still a lot worth fighting for.
The only thing keeping Manchin and his allies at the negotiating table is that a core group of Progressive champions in the House have refused to vote for Manchin’s so-called Exxon infrastructure Bill. Today, Nancy Pelosi and Congressional leaders are threatening to take away that leverage.
President Biden’s Build back better Plan is supposed to make historic investments in our communities, climate and the care economy. But Senator Manchin and his allies have not yet committed to voting for it. And until that commitment is secured, Congress must hold firm and delay passage of his infrastructure bill, which was mostly written by corporate and fossil fuel lobbyists.
Here are some of big investments in the Build Back Better agenda that are still worth fighting for:
- Reversing decades of inequity and poverty among children, people of color, women, LGBTQIA+ and people with disabilities; extending the expanded Child Tax Credit for a year and ensuring that its full assistance to the poorest families is permanent; expanding nutrition assistance, pre-k schooling and child care; helping make rent affordable; and improving healthcare.
- Older Americans will also benefit from greater access to home care and will gain hearing benefits through expanded Medicare. Millions of Americans will get jobs with higher pay through Build Back Better―in care work, clean energy, infrastructure, and much more. Workers with low incomes, who do not have dependents, will see a long-overdue increase in their Earned Income Tax Credit. Millions of immigrants will gain protections so they can work and contribute even more towards our economic growth.
- We pay for this historic human needs agenda by finally requiring the wealthy and corporations to pay more of their fair share in taxes.
- This historic legislation would be improved by the inclusion of paid family and medical leave and strengthening Medicare, including prescription drug price negotiation.
- And on climate a big, $500 billion investment in clean energy, electric cars, and clean and efficient mass transit. Plus a fee on fracked-gas methane, and an end to international financing and tax breaks for fossil fuel development projects (domestic fossil fuel subsidies are preserved in the current bill, but Senate negotiators are still working on that.)
Make sure these investments pass, and benefit working families, communities of color, and our country, we’re demanding all 50 U.S. senators pass the Build Back Better agenda before Manchin’s Exxon infrastructure bill is passed by the House of Representatives.
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