According to a source close to the process (look how professional and fancy we sound writing that), Biden was not too hip on the bipartisan bill meant to ban Russian oil. In fact, reading this thread from Jacqui Heinrich, it sounds like he ‘stalled it’.
Take a look:
🚨NEW, thread: Biden stalled bipartisan bill to ban Russian oil.
A source close to the process tells me that the House Ways and Means Committee worked all weekend in a bipartisan manner to develop a bill to ban all Russian oil imports…
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
Now, why oh why would Biden do that? You’d think if they put up a bipartisan bill he’d want to be on board what with his push for unity and stuff.
Keep going.
… and also remove PNTR (permanent normalized trade relations) from Russia, meaning that they would lose ‘most favored nation status’ on tariffs – but the President himself intervened to stop it.
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
The president himself intervened to stop it.
Again, why?
Sunday night, Ways and Means Democrats put out a press release about the bipartisan bill they were putting forward – but it was pulled down 5 minutes later. Reuters reported on it, but the bill was still never introduced all day yesterday….
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
Did we say wow yet?
No.
Because WOW.
…because this source tells me the White House called Ways & Means Dems and told them NOT to move forward on it.
Ways & Means Dems wanted to push ahead anyway – so at about 6:30 last night, someone from the White House called Pelosi’s office to intervene.
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
She was “not moved by their arguments” and her office told the WH staff they would be pushing ahead – so around 9:30 last night President Biden himself called Pelosi and asked her not to do it.
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
Pelosi told them to stick it.
Just putting it in Twitchy-terms.
You’re WELCOME.
Pelosi, I’m told, still did want to move ahead. So the White House then targeted Sen Wyden via Schumer, to get him to pull out on the Senate side so it would all fall apart.
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
What. The. Hell?
They believe this is because the WH did not want to appear that they had been boxed in by Congress on this issue – but it’s a snapshot of the friction between the WH and House Dems beneath the surface.
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
Interesting to see this … the idea of friction between Congress and the White House when Democrats ‘control’ both.
Members from both parties expressed frustration that they spent the whole weekend working in a bipartisan fashion only to get rolled by the WH.
**and as I type this, Reuters reports a WH announcement to ban Russian oil is imminent.
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) March 8, 2022
So what changed Biden’s mind? Why did the White House ‘roll’ bipartisan efforts?
Something strange is afoot at the Circle K.
***
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