Axing either of the two provisions would infuriate progressives and alienate valuable voting blocs. Yet the party might just have to.
www.politico.com
As for paid leave, the White House informed lawmakers last weekend that it wanted to drastically pare down those provisions in Democrats' party-line social spending package. Though the administration first proposed 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave for all workers funded at $225 billion, the president is now supportive of four weeks of paid leave for lower-income workers funded at $100 billion, five sources familiar with the conversations said Friday.
That’s nearly one-fifth of what the House approved for paid leave earlier this year: $494 billion. It’s even less than what the Senate has been pushing since this summer: $300 billion.
The benefits, disbursed on an income-based scale, would expire after an estimated three to four years, one source said — a nonstarter for most paid leave advocates, who say that the benefit’s permanence is critical to encouraging employers and states to participate in the program.
“A temporary paid leave program is insufficient,” said Molly Day, executive director of Paid Leave for the United States. “It is imperative that the final bill meets the desperate needs of working families with a permanent federal framework.”
The White House said Friday morning that it was considering cutting paid leave from the package, one source familiar with the conversations said.
Now, paid leave advocates are up in arms over what they see as an unwillingness by the White House to fight hard enough for even the slashed version of a reform that Biden campaigned heavily on, particularly as the U.S. recovers from a public health crisis that disparately affected women.
“It is inconceivable and unconscionable to me that there is any risk for a paid leave being on the chopping block, considering the ongoing pandemic, the women's jobs crisis, the care tsunami, the birth rate issues — all of the combined and overlapping crises deepening racial and gender inequality,” said Dawn Huckelbridge, director of Paid Leave for All. “The fact that something this administration has run on and Congress has championed would not be a priority to me is unbelievable.”
The White House has mostly deferred the blame for the paid leave cutbacks to Manchin, one source familiar with the conversations on the Hill said. Manchin himself has yet to go on record about whether the policy is a priority for him.
“I want to know whether [Biden] is putting his weight behind [paid leave] when he’s behind closed doors with Sen. Manchin and others that he’s negotiating with,” said Vicki Shabo, who studies paid leave at New America.
A spokesperson for Manchin did not respond to a request for comment Friday
www.newsweek.com
