AOC on Manchin’s Build Back Better opposition: ‘We knew he would do this months ago’

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York remains in her seat as Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia stands and applauds as President Donald Trump delivers his second State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress at the US Capitol on February 5, 2019. Jonathan Ernst / Reuters

AOC on Sunday said that Manchin turning on the Build Back Better bill was not a shock.

“People can be mad at Manchin all they want, but we knew he would do this months ago,” she tweeted.

The congresswoman voted against the bipartisan bill over concerns about the legislative process.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Sunday expressed little shock at Senator Joe Manchin’s blockbuster announcement that he would decline to back President Joe Biden’s signature Build Back Better Act, pointing to legislative concerns that progressives have raised for months regarding the roughly $US2 ($AU3) trillion social-spending bill.

After Manchin’s announcement, the two-term New York Democrat took to Twitter to reiterate her longstanding dissatisfaction with the way in which the bills have been handled on the House floor, continuing in her criticism of the decoupling of the $US1.2 ($AU2) trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill from larger package.

“When a handful of us in the House warned this would happen if Dem leaders gave Manchin everything he wanted 1st by moving BIF before BBB instead of passing together, many ridiculed our position,” she tweeted. “Maybe they’ll believe us next time. Or maybe people will just keep calling us naïve.”

She continued: “Either way, we cannot accept no for an answer. Dem leadership – incl but not limited to the President himself and House Dem leadership – wrote a massive check on their credibility the night of the BIF vote in order to secure the votes they needed, *promising* passage of BBB to every member who brought up Manchin, they personally promised they had a solution & BBB would pass. It is simply not an option for Dem leaders to walk from BBB, voting rights, etc. They must find a way, just as they promised they would when we raised this inevitability.”

Months before the bipartisan bill passed the House and was signed into law, progressives called on Democratic leadership to place both bills on the floor for a vote at the same time, while moderates pushed for a vote on the bipartisan bill – without tying it to the larger bill.

Moderates eventually won out, with the bipartisan infrastructure bill passing the lower chamber. However, Ocasio-Cortez was among only six Democratic House lawmakers to oppose the bill, largely based on mistrust over the legislative process.

“Throughout this process, people would say that within our caucus, one of the issues that we have had is trust. And trust is not built in the big moments. Trust is built in the little moments. Trust is built-in process,” she said last month.

“We were ready to vote on Build Back Better this week. At the very last minute, there was a group of people saying, ‘All of sudden, we need a CBO score.’ You’re claiming that you don’t want to let Build Back Better proceed unless you can get certainty on the deficit … [and] demand that you have a deficit-increase bill at the same time? It doesn’t add up. It’s weird. Something weird was going on,” she added at the time, frustrated by the demands from moderates.

While the House eventually passed their version of the Build Back Better Act last month, Manchin’s position — if he stands firm — effectively tosses aside the legislation in the Senate. The bill would establish universal pre-K, renew monthly child tax credit payments to families for another year, and tackle climate change, among other provisions.

Ocasio-Cortez pointed to Democratic leaders to resolve the problem, arguing that the party cannot give up on their shared values.

“People can be mad at Manchin all they want, but we knew he would do this months ago,” she tweeted. “Where we need answers from are the leaders who promised a path on BBB if BIF passed: Biden & Dem leaders. *They* chose to move BIF alone instead of w/ BBB, not Manchin. So they need to fix it.”