Senator attacks Bernie Sanders in dispute over Biden's spending plan
Bill endangered by lack of Republican support
West Virginia Democratic Senator Joe Manchin late Friday criticized fellow party member Bernie Sanders for trying to win support for President Joe Biden's multibillion-dollar spending package - the latest example of the dispute between major lawmakers over the plan.
Manchin tweeted concerns about the scope of the law in response to an editorial by Sanders, an independent Vermont senator, who spoke out in favor.
On Friday, West Virginia’s Charleston Gazette-Mail published an editorial by Sanders calling for support for the Democrats' plan to address wealth inequality, rising drug costs, increasingly expensive healthcare systems and costly childcare.
"Senator Sanders' response is to throw more money on an already overheated economy, while 52 other Senators have serious concerns about this approach," Manchin said in a statement posted on Twitter (NYSE: TWTR) on Friday Sanders described it as "out-of-state".
The bill is threatened by a lack of support from Senate Republicans and two moderate Democrats - Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona. Sinema has told House Democrats that they will not vote for the package until Congress passes a separate, non-partisan infrastructure bill worth $ 1 trillion.
Sinema and Manchin are resisting the Biden Plan's original price tag of $ 3.5 trillion on a spending measure to fund social programs and combat climate change. As a result, the president is faced with a difficult balancing act: he must try to cut costs without angering the progressive Democrats, who are also important in getting the bill through.