Joe Biden’s massive infrastructure and family-support plans are a direct appeal to the discontented White voters who put Donald Trump in office and to independent suburban women, his advisers say, with the president staking a claim on economic issues ahead of the 2022 midterm elections.
The so-called American Jobs Plan Biden released last month features spending on traditional infrastructure like highways and airports to better compete with China, a pitch his advisers think will resonate with Republican men and blue-collar workers.
And the “American Families Plan” he’ll outline this week seeks to broadly increase the availability of child care and improve working conditions for people caring for children and seniors—a top priority for suburban women, pollsters say.
Taken together, support from the two groups could form a potentially powerful bloc for Democrats ahead of the midterms, when the party of incumbent presidents typically loses seats in Congress. Republicans have long polled with voters as more trustworthy on economic stewardship, but Biden’s bet is that his proposals—even accompanied by price tags in the trillions of dollars and tax increases to help pay for them—can peel away enough GOP support that Democrats can keep control of the House and Senate.
Republican Attacks
It’s too soon to say whether Biden’s bet will pay off. His tax-and-spend plans offer ready-made material for GOP TV ads in races against vulnerable Democrats. Those may play particularly well in the Republican-leaning suburban districts Democrats seized to win their House majority in 2018. Republicans already are preparing their attack lines.
“This is sloppy liberal wish list that would spend a lot and get very little in return,” Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said on Monday of Biden’s proposals. He called the jobs plan “bloated, unfocused—it’s not a targeted recipe for better public works,” and suggested the families plan was “just as dishonest.”
Even so, Democrats cite surveys that show their arguments are hitting home.
One of Biden’s top pollsters during the 2020 campaign, Celinda Lake, said that when she surveyed voters on his infrastructure proposal last June and July, she anticipated Republicans would be repelled by the vast deficit spending it envisioned. Instead, a majority of GOP voters she polled said they supported government spending to rebuild roads and bridges and expand job training and access to broadband.
“It was a surprise to me,” she said.
Intentional Focus
White House senior adviser Anita Dunn said the infrastructure plan was intentionally focused on Americans in the lower quadrant of the economy.
“The people who will benefit a great deal from these policies are seen as Trump voters, rural people, rural White people, some blue-collar people,” she said.
The upcoming “American Families Plan” appeals to a separate but equally important demographic group for Democrats—independent suburban women, many of whom turned away from Trump in the 2020 election.