Manchin’s private proposal to the White House was made just days before a spectacular public collapse in negotiations between the White House and the West Virginia senator.
WASHINGTON – Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W. Va., last week made the White House a concrete counteroffer for its spending bill, saying he would accept a $1.8 trillion package that included universal prekindergarten for 10 years, an expansion of Obamacare, and hundreds of billions of dollars to combat climate change, three people familiar with the matter said. But Manchin’s counteroffer excluded an extension of the expanded Child Tax Credit the administration has seen as a cornerstone of President Joe Biden’s economic legacy, the people said, an omission difficult for the White House to accept in the high-stakes negotiations. The people spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the closed-door deliberations. Manchin’s private proposal to the White House – the details of which have not been previously reported – was made just days before a spectacular public collapse in negotiations between the White House and the West Virginia senator, marked by bitter and personal recriminations that left the status of the talks unclear. The White House was weighing how to respond to Manchin’s proposal last week when on Sunday he told Fox News that he would be unable to support the current version of Democrats’ Build Back Better agenda. White House press secretary Jen Psaki publicly called Manchin’s credibility into question a few hours later, saying his comments “are at odds with his discussions this week with the President, with White House staff, and with his own public utterances.” On Monday, Manchin again responded by criticizing White House staff for poisoning the negotiations. Spokespeople for the White House and Manchin declined to comment. The breakdown of negotiations threatens to seriously damage Biden’s presidency, and deprive Democrats of what they have characterized as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to combat climate change and remake the U.
