Biden’s Strongest 2024 Card Could Be the One He Hasn’t Really Played Yet
A newly repaired bridge in western Pennsylvania. Brand-new permanent homes for unhoused people near Austin, Texas. Almost half a billion dollars for expanding high-speed internet access in California. A renewed $77 million K-12 summer program in Reno, Nevada. A million dollars in affordable housing in Eau Claire, Wisconsin.
These recent initiatives distill the nuts-and-bolts vision of progress that President Joe Biden is looking to sell during his re-election campaign, which he officially launched on Tuesday.
Biden likes to invoke the legislation that made projects like these happen: the sweeping clean energy-focused Inflation Reduction Act, the $1 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the high-tech manufacturing-boosting CHIPS Act. Those three bills are poised to be pillars of Biden’s case for a second term. But there’s a fourth pillar that often seems forgotten—the one that made these specific projects, and many others, possible.