It is no coincidence that this document is being circulated just before Mr. Biden’s State of the Union address on March 1 and the Democrats’ “issues” caucuses in the House of Representatives next week.
Dozens of bills listed on the agenda are written by both Democrats and Republicans, many of them under threat either due to anti-Democratic sentiment or opponents endorsed by former President Donald Trump.
One such bill, written by Debbie Dingell, a Michigan Democrat, and Liz Cheney, a Wyoming Republican, provides for a permanent expansion of Medicare telemedicine undertaken during the pandemic. There is a diabetes prevention bill introduced by Congressmen Diana DeGette, Democrat of Colorado, and Tom Rice, Republican of South Carolina, who, like Ms. Cheney, voted to impeach Trump. The expansion of preferential tax savings accounts for education is being sponsored by Ms. Spanberger and Michigan Representative Fred Upton, another Republican who voted to impeach. Also included is a significant expansion of eligibility for child and adult nutrition programs drafted by Representatives Suzanne Bonamici, an Oregon Democrat, and Jaime Herrera Boytler, a Washington Republican facing a major Trump-backed challenge for her impeachment vote.
There are even incentives for utilities to invest in cybersecurity written by Senator Joe Manchin III of West Virginia, a Democrat who caused contempt for the left by blocking a social policy and climate change bill in the Senate and refusing to join his party in changing the filibuster rule to pass voter protection law against republican opposition.
But what’s most striking is how the draft agenda touches on issues that seem to dominate the campaign, even if they haven’t sparked much debate in the House and Senate.
To curb inflation, one bill the group is pushing would “ban” foreign governments from engaging in cartel-like activities, a blow to OPEC that would have no real impact. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission will be given the power to order the reimbursement of natural gas bills “that are unfair, unreasonable, unreasonably discriminatory, or preferential.” And new and small-scale meat processors will be helped to fight monopoly pricing by a few dominant meat processors, which the Biden administration is already undertaking.
Rising crime rates across the country will also draw attention with an expansion of existing grants for local law enforcement, new security requirements for taxi companies, stricter reporting requirements for electronic communications service providers to help track child predators, and a new federal definition crimes. for “household pirates” who steal packages from the porch of the house.