Thread by @MrSethHarris

A false narrative is developing that President Biden and Speaker McCarthy both won in the #defaultnegotiations. Wrong. President Biden badly beat McCarthy and Donald Trump. Here’s a thread with receipts and a close about why Biden won. (1/18)

Donald Trump openly campaigned for default and demanded McCarthy win everything plus the kitchen sink. . President Biden avoided default and McCarthy got no sinks. Loser? Donald Trump. (2/18)

Negotiating outcomes are driven by power + negotiating skill. Compare opening positions to the final deal and you measure comparative power and skill. Equal skill and power = deal will split differences. That’s NOT what happened here. No difference splitting. Biden won. (3/18)

McCarthy’s opening bid was the Lift, Save, Grow Act. congress.gov/bill/118th-con…. For @POTUS, it was a clean bill and avoiding catastrophic default. Here’s how the final deal compares to those opening positions. (4/18)

McCarthy’s Lift/Save/Grow had 11 components. Top line scorecard: McCarthy got exactly what he wanted on NONE of these 11 items. None. Biden got exactly what he wanted on 4 of 11 items + avoiding default. (5/18)

Those 4 items: no repeal of IRA clean energy credits; no Medicaid work requirements; no change to student debt plan; and no REINS Act (except two years of a very high threshold for review that’s waivable by the OMB Director). Here are the other 7 provisions: (6/18)

Lift/Save/Grow = raise the debt limit by $1.5 trillion or for 9 months. Deal = debt limit suspended (i.e., no cap) until after the 2024 elections. That’s a Biden-favorable compromise. (7/18)

Lift/Save/Grow = cap spending for 10 YEARS at FY’22 levels + 1% increases. Deal = 2-YEAR spending cap on non-defense at higher FY’23 levels + 1% increase in 2025 and NO caps after FY 2025. No difference splitting. Another Biden-favorable compromise. (8/18)

Lift/Save/Grow = radically weaken environmental protections and promote fossil fuel consumption. Deal = permitting relief for CLEAN energy transmission projects and a few EPA/agency process changes. Superficial compromise, Biden win. (9/18)

Lift/Save/Grow = rescind IRS $80 billion investment in tax enforcement against wealthy and corporate tax cheats. Deal = rescind only $20 billion, add it to non-defense discretionary spending! $60 isn’t halfway between $0 and $80. Biden-favorable compromise. (10/18)

Lift/Save/Grow = draconian work requirements on SNAP recipients. Deal = INCREASE number of Americans receiving SNAP, according to CBO. Call it a resource allocation compromise. (11/18)

Lift/Save/Grow = change TANF to put 1 million children’s benefits at risk. Deal = states can continue supporting the most vulnerable children. Biden-favorable compromise. (12/18)

Lift/Save/Grow = rescind all unspent COVID funding. Deal = protects key public health funding + funding for Indian Health Service, veterans medical care, housing assistance, more AND rescinded money applied to non-defense spending! Resource allocation compromise. (13/18)

Final scorecard: Biden wins 4 clean victories, 5 Biden-favorable compromises, and 2 resource-allocation compromises. McCarthy? No clean victories, no favorable compromises. That’s either a shutout or a rout, but it isn’t difference splitting. Biden won. (14/18)

That’s one reason more House Democrats voted for the deal than House Republicans. McCarthy’s conference members know he got rolled. They even tweeted about it.

https://twitter.com/chiproytx/status/1663256164618981376

. (15/18)

Why did Biden win? Biden’s values-driven. Biden understands working families’ needs and how government can help them succeed. He’s a legislative negotiations expert. He understands power and how to use it to achieve progress for the American people. (16/18)

Republicans aren’t fighting for values. They whine about deficits and then endorse making Trump’s tax cuts for the wealthiest permanent and adding trillions to the debt. This was posturing, not governing. (17/18)

President Joe Biden won these debt default negotiations over Speaker McCarthy. And Donald Trump? Wrong, extreme, and dangerous. (18/18)