A week ago, President Biden seemed down on his luck.
He was just diagnosed with COVID-19 after avoiding it for over two years.
He was attacked by people in his own party for appearing flat-footed on abortion.
The all-important climate legislation he pushed for seemed dead in the water.
And as if things couldn’t get any worse, The New York Times recently published a poll showing that most Democrats want someone else to run for their party’s nomination in 2024.
But a lot has changed in a week.
Biden beat his symptoms of COVID-19, and despite testing positive Saturday after days of testing negative in what his doctor thought was a resurgent case, the president appears to have avoided any serious illness.
Gasoline prices are at their lowest in weeks.
He will soon sign a bipartisan bill to boost the domestic chip industry, which is a top priority.
And there’s a new deal in the Senate on his domestic climate and health agenda that caught almost all of Washington off guard this week.
But all is not well for Biden. The Commerce Department on Thursday said the economy contracted for a second straight quarter, raising fears of a recession.
But overall, it was the president’s best week in a while. He even got some props from his old boss for the good news.
“This has been a big week for the Biden administration and the Democrats in Congress,” former President Obama said Thursday, highlighting the movement on the legislation. “Progress doesn’t always happen all at once, but it does happen – and this is what it looks like.”
Even Democrats, who questioned Biden’s leadership days earlier, were feeling more optimistic.
“He’s had a really good week,” said one Democratic strategist, who admitted to doubting the White House’s strategy — or lack thereof — earlier this month. “And it’s a good reminder that things in politics can change so quickly. Remember when everyone was writing those stories about Biden getting sick with COVID? That was a week ago.”
The legislative victories, while not yet set in stone, are potentially game-changing for Biden and Democrats after more than a year of wrangling in Congress — much of it messy and public — over Biden’s economic agenda.
Jim Kessler, executive vice president for policy at the centrist Democratic think tank Third Way, said that if both the semiconductor bill and the reconciliation package pass, “the first two years of the Biden administration are probably the longest of any Democratic president since Lyndon Johnson this way.”
“It shows competence,” he said.
Progressives hungry for climate action and frustrated by months of inaction have reason to look up because of the deal announced last week.
“If this bill passes, it’s not only historic, but it will help increase youth voter turnout,” said Cristina Cintzun Ramirez, president and CEO of the youth voting group NexGen America, noting that the policy for combating climate change was a major motivator for young voters in 2020 who turned out to support Biden.
It’s unclear, however, whether that enthusiasm will translate into greater support for Biden among young voters who polls show dislike Biden.
“At the end of the day, what I think people need to remember is that Biden was never the young candidate,” Cintzun Ramirez said. “If [Democrats are] being able to do that shows young people that their vote really does help achieve the political agenda they want.”
Biden is battling record high inflation and remains adrift in polls with a national average approval rating of around 38 percent.
But Democratic strategist Rodel Molino said Biden has been “unfairly hammered” by what he hasn’t accomplished compared to what he has accomplished, and the legislative deals are sure to energize him, especially when it comes to the base.
Molino acknowledged that it will continue to be a roller coaster ride for Biden.
“He’s going to have good weeks and bad weeks between now and the midterms and between now and his re-election,” he said.
Congressman Dean Phillips (D-Minn.) said in a local radio interview Thursday that he will not support Biden to run again in 2024, instead calling for a “generational shift” at the top of the ticket
“I think the country will be well served by a new generation of persuasive, well-prepared, dynamic Democrats stepping up,” he said on Chad Hartman’s radio show.
Those comments came after news of the massive reconciliation package deal sent most corners of the Democratic Party swimming with excitement.
“The president intends to run in 2024. We’re a long way from 2024,” White House press secretary Karin Jean-Pierre told reporters Friday when asked about Phillips’ remarks. “We will continue to focus on doing business for the American people, delivering for families, lowering costs for families.”
A CNN poll this week found that 75 percent of Democrats want someone other than Biden to run in 2024, following a similar poll earlier this month by The New York Times and Siena College.
That leaves some Biden skeptics to turn things around.
“At the end of the day, people who don’t like Biden are still not going to like Biden if they’re concerned about everything from his age to his political acumen, I don’t think that changes the needle that much,” said Basil Smickle, a Democratic strategist. and Director of the Public Policy Program at Hunter College.
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But Molino said he thinks that often journalists and talking heads “look at the last bit of data and make long-term assumptions” about Biden’s viability.
He added that Biden is good at playing the long game.
“How many times has he been written off for dead in the 2020 primaries?” he said. “So many people were ready and willing to write him off, but he’s playing a much bigger game than a news cycle.”
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