Ahead of President Biden’s futile attempt to gin up support for a federal takeover of elections with a Tuesday speech in Georgia, even MSNBC admitted there was no possibility of it getting through the evenly divided Senate. During her 9:00 a.m. ET show, anchor Stephanie Ruhle went so far as to say that “Jesus” himself wouldn’t be able to help Biden sell the doomed legislation.
“So as much as the Biden administration wants to drum up this speech, talk about all the influential people who are going to be there, it doesn’t matter if Joe Biden brings Steve Jobs, Jesus and Marilyn Monroe, if he cannot get Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema on board, things aren’t gonna move,” Ruhle proclaimed.
Punchbowl News co-founder John Bresnahan chuckled and agreed with her blunt assessment: “Yeah, it’s not gonna change....with 50 Senate Democrats, you can’t lose one Democrat. They don’t have Manchin, they don’t have Sinema.”
In the 10:00 a.m. ET hour, Bresnahan’s fellow Punchbowl News co-founder Jake Sherman told anchor Jose Diaz-Balart:
...the voting rights effort is a show. It’s not going anywhere. Joe Manchin just said today, this morning, for the 100th or 200th time, we’ve lost count, that he’s not going to change the Senate rules without Republican buy-in, period. He just keeps saying that over and over again, it’s unclear to me why people won’t believe him.
“There is no chance that this Democratic voting rights bill is going to pass, given what we know right now,” he emphasized.
Sherman said of Biden’s address: “The base wants him to have this fight. It’s a fight he’s going to lose almost certainly, but he has to do it....So Biden is going to Atlanta to try to make this speech to show a fight that he’s eventually going to lose.”
Minutes later, after Diaz-Balart wondered if Biden was trying to create a “positive momentum impact by November” and the midterm elections, Sherman skeptically responded: “I don’t know. I’m not entirely sure....the White House understands the reality on Capitol Hill that this isn’t gonna pass, but they have to show a fight.”
He reiterated once again: “And it’s an unenviable situation for a White House, to be honest with you, to have to get in and lean into a fight that it has – that it knows it has absolutely no chance of winning in any time in the near future.”
When even MSNBC anchors and pundits are acknowledging the reality that Democrats have no chance of forcing their radical agenda through Congress, you know things are going badly for the Biden White House.
Here is a transcript of excerpts of the January 11 coverage:
Stephanie Ruhle Reports
9:12 AM ET(...)
STEPHANIE RUHLE: So as much as the Biden administration wants to drum up this speech, talk about all the influential people who are going to be there, it doesn’t matter if Joe Biden brings Steve Jobs, Jesus and Marilyn Monroe, if he cannot get Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema on board, things aren’t gonna move.
JOHN BRESNAHAN [PUNCHBOWL NEWS CO-FOUNDER]: Yeah, it’s not gonna change. As you noted in your lead, first of all, there’s 50 Republicans against it, there’s not one Republican vote, so they start there. So you can’t lose – with 50 Senate Democrats, you can’t lose one Democrat. They don’t have Manchin, they don’t have Sinema. They may not have – there may be other senators, we don’t know, because they’ve never pushed a vote.
(...)
Jose Diaz-Balart Reports
10:13 AM ET(...)
JOSE DIAZ-BALART: Jake, there is the reality of possible political eroding power, right? I mean, after today, will Congress be anywhere close to the tangible action these voting rights advocates want to see?
JAKE SHERMAN [PUNCHBOWL NEWS CO-FOUNDER]: No, the voting rights effort is a show. It’s not going anywhere. Joe Manchin just said today, this morning, for the 100th or 200th time, we’ve lost count, that he’s not going to change the Senate rules without Republican buy-in, period. He just keeps saying that over and over again, it’s unclear to me why people won’t believe him. Leave aside the propriety or the substance of whether this legislation is needed for a second. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema have said, time and time again, they’re not going to change the rules to allow for this thing to pass without Republican buy-in. Sinema – by the way, yesterday, Jon Tester has said he’s not interested in a carve out. He’s a little skeptical of a carve out for voting rights.
There is no chance that this Democratic voting rights bill is going to pass, given what we know right now. Now, could things change? Sure, it could become 80 degrees from 20 degrees in Washington today. We don’t think that’s going to happen, but could happen. Number two, there’s another effort that’s going on, a bipartisan effort, on a very different and slimmed down and less-ambitious voting rights package, that Manchin is involved with.
So once this process plays out, and it’s clear to most people now, but once it’s clear to everybody else, that this voting rights effort is not going to work, they might switch over to that bipartisan package. We’ll have to see. Which is very, very tailored. It deals with how Congress certifies elections and some other things we reported this morning in Punchbowl News AM. And that could be, if the White House embraces it, that could be a victory.
But listen, Carol is absolutely right. The base wants him to have this fight. It’s a fight he’s going to lose almost certainly, but he has to do it. Because otherwise he’s sitting on his hands. So Biden is going to Atlanta to try to make this speech to show a fight that he’s eventually going to lose.
(...)
10:17 AM ET
JOSE DIAZ-BALART: So, Jake, is it that what happens in January, from the White House’s perspective, hopefully, will have a positive momentum impact by November, but is that good math?
SHERMAN: I don’t know. I’m not entirely sure. I mean, I guess if this is an exercise to gin up your base, then maybe it helps around the edges. But, basically, what the White House has decided here, and again, I understand their strategy. They want their base to be energized. They’ve gotten a lot of criticism for not pushing voting rights strong enough. What they’re hoping is that their base sees a fight, which is what they want.
But on the other hand, when you say you expect a bill on your desk, I mean, I’m not sure, for people who are just watching and scrolling on Twitter or however people consume news these days, you might think that that’s going to happen. And the reason this isn’t happening, yes, Republicans are against it, but Democrats are against it, too, and Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema are gonna shoulder a lot of the blame, when in reality, the White House understands the reality on Capitol Hill that this isn’t gonna pass, but they have to show a fight.
And it’s an unenviable situation for a White House, to be honest with you, to have to get in and lean into a fight that it has – that it knows it has absolutely no chance of winning in any time in the near future.
(...)
