Joe Biden arms his cabinet under pressure from the progressive wing of the Democratic Party

Joe Biden is not having it easy at all. He faces a president who lost the election and remains entrenched in the White House, denying him a transition as the law requires.

At the same time, the elected president must look ahead and train his cabinet like a tightrope walker: representative of the most centrist and moderate sector of the Democratic Party, Biden now handles progressive wing pressure of his own group, which prompts him to elect several of his representatives to the government to carry out a more center-left oriented agenda.

Two major progressive groups, the Sunrise Movement and Justice Democrats, presented Biden this week with a list of 13 names as potential ministers, including, among others, Senator Elizabeth Warren as Secretary of the Treasury and Senator Bernie Sanders on the Labor portfolio. . Also to Nobel Laureate in Economics Joseph Stiglitz – mentor of Argentine Minister Martín Guzmán at Columbia University and advisor to the Kirchner government – as eventual head of the National Economic Council.

In addition, these groups have called on Biden to create a special office dedicated to climate change that reports directly to the president to give high visibility to the fight against global warming.

This presentation meant the end of the truce between Biden’s moderates and the younger and more progressive of the party, which united after the primaries with the common goal of defeating Donald Trump.

Possible friction

James Thurber, professor of government at the American University, said Bugle that “the party will have serious tensions between the two sectors. While Biden has a pragmatic centrist will to engage and work with a variety of factions, it will be a problem with the sector further to the left. “And he predicted that there could be friction on issues such as the fight against the coronavirus, the economy, racial justice, health care and tax reform not only with divisions within the party but also with Republicans in the Senate.

The landscape in front of Biden is complicated. He did not win a landslide and is estimated to have to deal a lot more than he thought with the Republicans in Congress, who may still hold a majority in the Senate.

Also, the Democrats reduces the number of seats in the House of Representatives And in that sense, there are bills: Moderate Democrats say it’s because progressives had overly sweeping proposals that scared independents and more leftists argue it was because Biden had a speech typical of the establishment.

It is estimated that it will be very difficult to include high level officials like Sanders and Warren, who have been systematically referred to by Trump as “radical socialists” – at the level of the Castro or Nicolás Maduro regime – although their ideas are more in line with those of a social democratic government.

Biden must find an extreme balance with his cabinet. First there is the battle for the Senate which is not yet defined because it depends on the results of the Georgian election on January 5, which will confirm whether the upper house remains in the hands of the Republicans or whether there is a virtual link that would define Vice President Kamala Harris.

The problem is not minor as the early appointment of Warren or Sanders could have an impact on that state’s elections and could end Democratic aspirations to return to the Senate.

In addition, most ministers are appointed by the president, but must be approved by the Senate. If it remains in Republicans’ hands, names like Warren or Sanders will hardly pass. Another problem is that they are both senators and their possible exit from the upper house to join the cabinet does not guarantee that they will be replaced by someone from their party, as the states they come from have Republican governments. and it is not clear how the position will be filled.

So far, the president-elect has chosen only the post of chief of staff, which will go to Ron Klein, a veteran Democrat who worked with him when he was vice president, a position that does not need to be ratified by the Senate. The rest is subject to careful analysis, and of those ringing, there are quite a few progressives.

Consulted by BugleVincent Hutchings, professor of political science at the University of Michigan, has taken an optimistic approach. “The most progressive wing and the most central wing can coexist. This is in part because the “centrist” wing, presumably represented by Biden, is not so centrist. In some ways, including health care, taxes and the environment, Biden is the most liberal Democratic president since Lyndon Johnson. So, although there are differences between the two positions, they are not as big as one would suppose ”.

Moreover, added the expert, “the two parts of the Democratic coalition had their opposition to Trump to reduce their differences. Now that the president has been defeated, they still have common goals, such as tackling the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change. So overall, I hope they work together effectively to deal with Biden. “

Washington, correspondent

CB