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Biden OMB candidate apologizes for past tweets
President Joe Biden’s pick as the head of the Bureau of Management and Budget apologized Tuesday for spending years attacking senior Republicans on social media. (February 9)
AP
WASHINGTON – Tension between Senator Bernie Sanders and Neera Tanden, President Joe Biden’s candidate for the Bureau of Management and Budget, spilled over Wednesday as Tanden faced a second round of grids over his comments barbed wire on Twitter on Democrats and Republicans.
Sanders, chairman of the Senate Budget Committee tasked with vetting Tanden before her confirmation went to a floor vote, took advantage of the hearing to highlight his icy relationship with her both over her personal attacks as well as that on corporate donations to the Left Think Tank for American Progress received under his leadership.
“Your attacks weren’t just directed against Republicans. There were vicious attacks against progressives, people that I have worked with, me personally,” Sanders said, asking if she would take a different approach in as Biden’s budget chief.
Tanden, who apologized to Sanders during her opening speech, said she regretted the statements she made on social media. The OMB candidate echoed her apology to Republican senators on another panel that confronted her on Tuesday about her past tweets.
“My language and my expressions on social media have hurt people, and I feel bad about it. And I really regret it and I recognize that it is really important for me to demonstrate that I can work with others, ”she said. “I would say social media leads to too much personal commentary and my approach will be drastically different.”
Tanden, who has led the CAP for nearly a decade and has lapped her credentials in the Clinton and Obama administrations, faces a bumpy Senate confirmation hearing as she faces criticism from both sides of the House. the aisle about his social media comments that sometimes got personal. attacks on lawmakers.
As director of the OMB, Tanden would occupy a central political role in the White House, helping Biden deliver on campaign promises like improving the ACA – which Tanden helped push forward in Congress under the former President Barack Obama – as well as overseeing the President’s budget.
After: ‘Radioactive’? Neera Tanden, Biden’s choice for budget chief, tries to win over critics on the left and right
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AP
Sanders also expressed concern over the millions of dollars in corporate donations CAP received during his tenure, citing a report that the organization received at least $ 33 million from companies such as Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Google since 2014.
“So before you vote on your nomination, it is important for me and the members of this committee to know that the donations you have secured at CAP will not influence your decision making at OMB,” said Sanders.
Tanden has vowed that the relationship will have “no impact” on his decision-making as budget chief.
The couple have had a strained relationship since Sanders ran against former Tanden boss Hillary Clinton in the 2016 Democratic presidential primary election. In 2019, Sanders wrote a scathing letter to CAP and CAP Action Fund accusing the organization of “bad faith denigration” and criticizing Tanden for calling “for unity while slandering my staff and supporters and belittling progressive ideas.”
South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, the senior Republican on the committee, dismissed concerns about Tanden’s use of corporate donations, but harassed her for her personal attacks on Sanders during her presidential run from 2016.
Graham read aloud one of his tweets: “Russia did a lot more to help Bernie than the DNC’s random internal emails did to help Hillary.”
“All I can say is this is not the unifying choice I was looking for for this position,” Graham added.
Senator John Kennedy, R-Louisiana, took to Tanden for his social media posts.
“You call Senator Sanders anything but an ‘ignorant bitch,’ he remarked.
Tanden insisted it wasn’t true, which prompted Kennedy to insist that she meant the comments at the time.
“I must have thought of them but I really regret them,” she replied finally.
Democrats on social media were quick to point out that GOP senators who expressed outrage at Tanden’s tweets largely ignored former President Donald Trump’s vitriolic rhetoric on social media.
Although Sanders was quick to rehash his differences with Tanden, he introduced policies he agrees with her in, including free public college tuition for low-income earners, l lowering the Medicare age, raising the minimum wage to $ 15 an hour, paid family and medical leave and universal pre-K among others.
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