Send tips | Subscribe here | Email Alex | Email Tina Welcome to POLITICO’s West Wing Playbook, your guide to the people and power centers in the Biden administration. With help from Allie Bice. This coming week, Senate Democrats will force an end of sorts to bipartisan negotiations around a major infrastructure bill when they bring that bill to a vote. In that moment, it will be clear whether President JOE BIDEN’s insistence that compromise is possible in the age of polarization is either true or bunk. But while the verdict’s still out on the president’s ability to woo Republicans, his grip on his fellow Democrats seems abundantly clear. Since unveiling a $2 trillion infrastructure bill on March 31, Biden has dramatically scaled down his ambitions, engaged in one set of negotiations with Republicans, and embarked on an entirely new round when the first failed. The White House’s mantra once was that the times didn’t allow for half measures and patience. Since then, it’s been replaced by the argument that the public will reward bipartisanship, or an honest attempt at it. Through it all, Democrats have, despite the occasional angst, remained on board. This is not the common equilibrium for the party. And the most obvious reason for it is that there hasn’t been much to truly freak out about. The possibility of moving a second bill without Republican support meant that any sacrifices made at the altar of bipartisanship could be remedied down the line. Climate change got short shrift in the infrastructure bill? Stack it into the reconciliation measure! “We face cascading crises,” said Sen. BRIAN SCHATZ (D-Hawaii), explaining that Biden was given latitude precisely because of confidence that he’d eventually deliver, “and the moment demands that we avoid ‘pilot projects’ and nibbling around the edges.” But another reason Biden has kept his party in line is that he tends to it. Progressives have routinely praised the White House for keeping lines of communications open, soliciting feedback, and adjusting on the fly. When climate activists told the administration they were concerned that calling the reconciliation package “The Families Plan” made it hard for them to message around it, Biden and his team quickly adjusted. They reverted to calling it Build Back Better and then reaffirmed the climate provisions that they wanted in it. "This is a story about the White House folks listening to us," one climate activist told West Wing Playbook. "They didn't have to put out the memo on climate needs in reconciliation or Biden's speech [around Build Back Better]. They did." It hasn’t always been this way. Back in 2010, when President BARACK OBAMA was trying to move his health care bill through Congress, recriminations flew back and forth between Democrats on each side of Pennsylvania Avenue. Aides to Senate Majority Leader HARRY REID (D-Nev.) bristled at how chief of staff RAHM EMANUEL was handling negotiations. The White House barely hid their disdain for the Hill’s second-guessing of their approach. Press secretary ROBERT GIBBS , at one point, admonished the “professional left” for having “crazy” notions about the president and what he needed to achieve politically. It crested in a now infamous retreat, where then-Sen. AL FRANKEN (D-Minn.) showered a series of expletives on senior adviser DAVID AXELROD for not explaining how they’d pass Obamacare after losing their 60th vote in the Senate with the election of SCOTT BROWN. “David got up to speak and gave us nothing. Five minutes passed, nothing. I’m just exploding,” Franken recalled in an interview. “I get called on. And I just use the f-bomb. I can’t say I used it more than I should have, but more than I had used it. I said, ‘What the hell is going on here. What the fuck are we doing? What are we doing?’” Axelrod, at that point, challenged him to find the votes, which Franken (admittedly, not in the calmest of states) said was not his job. They went back and forth with no resolution, after which the more mild-mannered Sen. BILL NELSON was called on. “And he goes, ‘Uh, David, you didn’t answer Al’s question,’” Franken recalled. The fissures among Democrats that year ultimately didn’t doom Obamacare. When the bill finally passed, Franken took a piece of Senate stationery and sent Axelrod a note with two words on it: “You're welcome.” The two are on friendly terms — Franken just appeared on Axelrod’s podcast. And the Minnesota Democrat said he suspects one of the reasons there have been no similar near-mutinies this time around as Biden took his time negotiating with Republicans is that the party learned from the past. “I think they are going for stuff. I think part of it is our experience from that, which was, we lost the House in 2010 and also we set ourselves up for that August, which was not a good recess,” Franken said. “So I hope we learned a lot from that.” Do you work in the Biden administration? Are you in touch with the White House? Are you MOLLY GROOM? We want to hear from you — and we’ll keep you anonymous: westwingtips@politico.com. Or if you want to stay really anonymous send us a tip through SecureDrop, Signal, Telegram, or Whatsapp here. | 
