The intractable
disagreements with Manchin and Sinema about the size and scope of the economic package have produced weeks of ugly deadlock among Democrats -- and Manchin's unexpectedly harsh denunciation of the party's sweeping economic development and social safety net bill on Monday points to possibly more weeks of conflict, with no guarantee that he will ultimately support the plan and allow it to pass.
But while the continuing resistance from Manchin, and potentially Sinema, could still
derail the key elements of Biden's domestic agenda, many Democrats from across the party's ideological spectrum say the process has revealed less a fundamental fissure between left and center than the challenge of coping with the unique and sometimes opaque resistance from two senators empowered with personal "veto power" by the Senate's 50-50 split.
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