Joe Biden, this Thursday at the White House after delivering his economic speech.Evan Vucci / AP
US President Joe Biden on Thursday defended his socioeconomic plan to support the middle class and, by extension, to fight poverty. The Democratic president has assured that he will lower taxes for the most disadvantaged classes, a measure that can benefit some 50 million Americans, and will raise them for citizens with higher incomes. The tax reform proposal had already been advanced by the White House, as a means of financing the colossal infrastructure and social coverage plans that constitute the core of its mandate. But the Republican opposition and the rejection of the moderate Democrats to a social plan with a planned investment of 3.5 billion dollars have pushed the president to get personally involved in the fight, still incipient in Congress, to endorse the proposal.The $ 1.2 trillion physical infrastructure plan received bipartisan support last June, but a number of doubts and fears surround the processing of the social program.
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In a speech from the White House, Biden announced "a historic tax cut for the middle class" - which he always defines as the backbone of the country - while ensuring that large corporations and the wealthiest will have to start paying "your fair share of taxes", reversing the tax cut adopted during the term of Donald Trump.
It is therefore, as the White House had advanced in a statement on Thursday, to "establish fairer [economic] rules of the game to guarantee that the middle class, the backbone of our country, can finally breathe."
"In the last forty years," Biden has said, "the rich have gotten even richer, and big business has lost a sense of social responsibility." "Ordinary, hard-working Americans have simply been pushed aside," he stressed, defending his program as something that "could change the trajectory of the United States for years to come, maybe even decades."
Biden wants to focus on his domestic agenda, which will theoretically define his mandate, to forget the resentments of the hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan. And to silence, this Thursday, the noise caused by the unexpected announcement, the day before, of a strategic alliance in the Pacific together with the United Kingdom and Australia. In a short speech, Biden defended his social vision of the economy and was confident that Congress will give the green light to the gigantic package of measures that expand social coverage in all areas, from early childhood education to the care of minors or dependents, going through the scope of the Medicare and Medicaid social security programs. “I know we still have a long way to go,but I trust that Congress will send me soon the bipartisan [supported] infrastructure plan and the Rebuild Better plan that I proposed, ”said Biden, using the official name of the social coverage program.
The president is scheduled to speak with House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi and Senate leaders Chuck Schumer on the legislative agenda on Thursday.
The day before, he met separately with two Democratic senators, from the more moderate faction of the party.
Both centrists oppose the disbursement of 3.5 trillion dollars for fear of the impact on the public spending deficit or for rejection of a tax increase on the highest incomes, just what the Democratic president announced this Thursday.
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