Lee Carter says Biden’s polling 'underwater' ahead of State of the Union
President at Maslansky & Partners Lee Carter on Biden struggling with voters and the administration defending its economic policies.
EXCLUSIVE: President Biden is expected to use his State of the Union address Tuesday night to lay out a "starkly different" plan for the economy than what House Republicans have proposed, and will reject specific GOP positions on taxes and social spending, Fox News has learned.
The president’s plan to show this contrast comes as the White House is also pushing Biden’s "Unity Agenda," and after his pledge to work in a bipartisan manner with GOP lawmakers.
Fox News obtained a memo from White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates on Tuesday afternoon ahead of the State of the Union, which lays out how Biden plans to address the differences in his agenda versus plans rolled out by House Republicans.
"Tonight President Biden will demonstrate how to build on the historic progress he has achieved ensuring our economy works from the bottom-up and the middle out – not the top down," Bates wrote. "To finish the job he started in the first two years of his first term, the President will show the country a blueprint for how to sustain the manufacturing and jobs boom his agenda is fueling, keep fighting inflation and cutting costs, protect Medicare and Social Security, and continue bringing down the deficit by having the wealthy and big corporations pay more of their fair share."
Bates added: "Unfortunately, since taking the House, congressional Republicans have chosen a starkly different path: selling out working people with tax welfare for rich special interests that would heap $3 trillion onto the deficit, including with the biggest Medicare benefits cut in decades."
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President Biden is expected to reject GOP positions on taxes and spending in his State of the Union address, even as he calls for a "unity" agenda. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
Bates said that "instead of rewarding hard work, the through line of House Republicans’ proposals has been leveraging government power to provide handouts to the wealthy and big corporations at the expense of everyone else."
Bates laid out a side-by-side comparison showing the "key differences" between what the president will discuss Tuesday night and "what House Republicans have used their majority to press for."
First, Bates said Biden will "propose adding to the historic deficit reduction he has achieved by having the wealthy and big corporations pay their fair share." Bates said Biden will do this by rolling out a "Billionaire Tax" and a tax on corporate stock buybacks that "benefit shareholders and shortchange workers."
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Bates said House Republicans, in contrast, are pushing to renew Trump tax cuts, which he said "added trillions to the deficit."
Next, Bates said Biden will advocate for expanding the $35 insulin price cap that the Inflation Reduction Act set for Medicare recipients to "all Americans who need it."
"This is in addition to the Inflation Reduction Act’s $2,000 limit on out-of-pocket spending on prescription drugs for Americans on Medicare, and Medicare’s new power to negotiate lower drug costs," Bates wrote.
Bates wrote that House Republicans introduced legislation last week to repeal the Inflation Reduction Act, which he said "would be one of the biggest cuts to Medicare benefits in history."
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has repeatedly said Republicans are not looking to cut Social Security or Medicare. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)
"President Biden will reaffirm that protecting Medicare and Social Security from cuts is a cornerstone of his agenda, highlighting that all working Americans pay throughout their lives to earn these benefits for when they retire," Bates said. "But congressional Republicans have spent months fighting to cut Medicare and Social Security benefits, even threatening an unprecedented default if they can’t force these changes on the country."
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House Republicans have repeatedly rejected the White House's claims that they have plans to cut Social Security and Medicare.
"Cuts to Medicare and Social Security are off the table," House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said just hours before the White House memo was obtained by Fox News.
On Sunday, Biden tweeted that the GOP will cut those programs as part of their effort to trim spending, and said he "won’t stand for that."
But that message was flagged by Twitter users, who pointed to comments from Republicans that cuts to Social Security and Medicare aren’t being considered.
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House Speaker Kevin McCarthy criticized President Biden's demands on the debt ceiling in a State of the Union prebuttal. (Getty Images)
In his memo, Bates said Biden will also stress his view that women should have the right to choose and make her own health care decisions, in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision last year to overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade case, and return the issue of abortion back to the states.
"President Biden will also stand with the majority of Americans who believe that a woman should make her own health care decisions, never politicians," Bates wrote. "But even though the country was unmistakably clear about this issue in November, House Republicans have again and again sought to impose national abortion bans."
A GOP source, though, told Fox News Digital that the Republican Party is not trying to push proposals related to abortion that the American people do not support, but rather will seek limits on late-term abortion, which the source said is supported by most Americans.
Biden’s second State of the Union address comes just weeks after the U.S. government reached its borrowing limit and is now undertaking "extraordinary measures" to avoid going over the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling. Some agreement will be needed by early June if the U.S. is going to avoid default on its current obligations.
Biden and McCarthy met at the White House last week to discuss raising the debt ceiling. It was their first meeting since McCarthy took the speaker’s gavel.
McCarthy on Monday urged Biden not to draw "lines in the sand," but to negotiate to find "sensible, responsible solutions to our growing national debt."
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He said his preference is that both sides meet, just as Biden participated in debt ceiling talks years ago as a senator. He said "common ground" must be found that allows for a "responsible" debt ceiling increase.
"Finding compromise is exactly how governing in America is supposed to work – and exactly what the American people voted for just three months ago," McCarthy said.
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