Biden sells government as a solution in Covid-19 relief sales pitch

Visiting the warehouse of a flooring company here Tuesday to begin selling his $1.9 trillion Covid-19 relief law, President Joe Biden seemed ready to sign something else.

“Anything else we can be doing?” he asked the business owners, who seemed grateful to chat up the visiting president.

If the primary goal of Biden’s “Help is Here” tour, which kicked off this week, is to claim credit for the massive and mostly popular Covid-19 relief package, his tacit objective is to convince Americans there is more the government can do to make their lives better.

The road show, which spans the country from coast to coast, will bring the first lady, vice president, second gentleman and Cabinet members to mostly battleground states that were key to Biden’s election victory in November.

Making political hay out of the $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package — which no Republicans voted for but which remains overwhelmingly popular among Americans — is top of mind for the President, who believes similar efforts were absent more than a decade ago after another stimulus measure passed.

But Biden and his top aides say the tour’s more important purpose is to muster support for the idea that government can solve big problems — capital the President will need as he moves to the next big-ticket items on his agenda, which this time will likely come with tax hikes.

“I think you should be aware, more help is on the way, for real,” Biden told the owners, Kristin and James Smith.

Standing inside the flooring company outside Philadelphia, Biden sought to frame his efforts as necessary to keeping businesses like this one afloat. The company, Smith Flooring, received business loans during Biden’s term but also under then-President Donald Trump. The White House said the company would benefit from new programs in the relief bill that help companies navigate the Byzantine application process, as well as from an employee-retention tax credit.

The President took swipes at similar programs administered under his predecessor, saying it was too difficult for businesses like the one he was visiting — which has 22 employees during peak season and operates from a small facility set back from the road in a commercial district — to receive funds.

“You got very big businesses getting the lion’s share of that money. So when we wrote this rescue plan, we insisted that we have an inspector general to make sure the money goes exactly where it’s supposed to go,” he said.

In highlighting the assistance his administration is offering, Biden was implicitly making the broader case that big government, when functioning properly, is a good thing.

He said a day earlier that his goal was to improve the view of the government among Americans.

“We have to prove to the American people that their government can deliver for them,” Biden said Monday as he explained how the White House planned to roll out the massive new law.

“That’s our job,” he said. “That’s our responsibility.”

Biden said last month he did not believe the stimulus passed in 2009 under President Barack Obama was properly sold to the American people; he claimed he told Obama as much but was rebuffed.

The circumstances now are different from more than a decade ago. Obama entered office at the very start of the economic meltdown while Biden entered office nearly a year into the pandemic; while it was difficult to see a way out of the crisis in March 2009, there is now light at the end of the Covid-19 tunnel thanks to a massive vaccination effort.

After years of avoiding outward embrace for big government policies, Biden is banking on parallel health and economic crises — aggravated by government mismanagement under the previous administration — to make Americans more welcoming of his bid to expand the social safety net.

Speaking at a school for baristas in Las Vegas on Monday, Vice President Kamala Harris said the goal of the administration travel efforts was to ensure Americans knew what they were getting under the law.

“We want to avoid a situation where people are unaware of what they’re entitled to,” Harris said. “It’s not selling it; it literally is letting people know their rights. Think of it more as a public education campaign.”

Harris will continue her efforts in Denver on Tuesday at a vaccination clinic and a small empanada business. First lady Jill Biden spoke with students at a school in New Jersey on Monday and will visit New Hampshire later in the week.

Many of the states that administration officials are visiting this week are critical electoral battlegrounds and the law’s popularity among the American people is helping Biden and his surrogates promote the plan to Americans eager for relief.

A smooth rollout of the new law will be essential for maintaining its majority support among Americans. There were positive signs on that front this weekend as direct stimulus payments began hitting Americans’ bank accounts. But officials say there are still potential hiccups ahead, including administering the expanded child tax credit through the IRS and getting billions of dollars to state and local governments efficiently and without waste.

Biden on Monday named Gene Sperling, a top economic official in previous Democratic administrations, to oversee the implementation efforts.

White House officials acknowledge the law’s implementation will go a long way in convincing Americans’ that further spending — and potential tax increases — are needed to pull the country from crisis.

What that next step will be remains an open question. White House advisers have discussed with Biden their options on next legislative moves but haven’t yet come to a conclusion, according to officials.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told her members last week to begin working with Republicans on infrastructure proposals, a good indication that is in Biden’s sights.

Yet a growing humanitarian problem at the southern border has also lent urgency to immigration reform, another of Biden’s top priorities.