Page 27 - House Progressives News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

I talked to alexandria ocasio-cortez, one of the leading house progressives, and she told me that a framework does not mean a deal. just because there's a framework, it could be months until there's actual legislative text. and what does that look like? this is a short framework, a handful of pages here. but the details of the bill would be hundreds, if not thousands of pages, and that could take weeks and weeks and weeks, months potentially to put together. that is the real concern of the white house right now, that if they listen to what the progressives are saying, if pelosi ultimately is f...

What we're trying to highlight to our colleagues is this is the first step, the next step. we will have other bills as well that will come up. we be build upon this framework, but right now we need to do this bill. >> congressman, candidly, that is where you all have been for a really long time, saying this is a first step, there is a next step, and more work to be done. are you calling the progressives' bluff? >> the difference is that the president came to the house democratic caucus and asked for this vote. that's the difference. so before we were dealing with time lines, dealing with discu...

He's going overseas and vote down this infrastructure bill. and she went further. she said she would put this bill on the floor and leave the vote open, try to force members to get behind this ultimately. now, she got some pushback by the congressman from illinois who said about manchin and sinema? she responded, look, take the president at his word. he said he's going to get this bill through. listen to him, and ultimately this will get passed because of the work he's done with those two moderates. is that enough to convince the progressives? i heard going into today there are about 55 house ...

Pass the house at the same time as that infrastructure bill passes the house. they believe that withholding their support is leverage, supports moderates behind the larger bill. the democratic leaders are trying to convince the progressives to change their mind, and that is the challenge for joe biden, urging his caucus to get behind this saying they need to pass this today. the question is how any of these progressives will react to this. going into the meeting, they made clear they were not going to change their mind. they believe that it doesn't make sense for them to simply vote yes on tha...

Be. is there enough trust between house progressives and the senate moderates to actually move ahead and start voting on the infrastructure legislation and then of course build back better. right now it sounds like we're still in the same place, which is that progressives perhaps have enough votes to say no, we want to see that legislative text. >> remarkable, too, looking at this. i have to wonder, there was a lot of pressure weeks ago for the president to be more involved. we saw the involvement ramp up in the last week or so especially, making his way to capitol hill this morning. that is n...