Joe Biden may still occupy the Oval Office, but it is clearer than ever that he is no longer in charge of Washington.
More than a half-dozen Democratic lawmakers in the House of Representatives said Thursday that the conference had not yet heard from the president, even as Congress tried to salvage a funding deal and prevent a government shutdown.
In the 24 hours since President-elect Donald Trump and his close ally Elon Musk abruptly derailed the bipartisan deal, Biden has remained conspicuously absent beyond a brief statement from his press secretary — and for now, Democrats said there was little clamor for him to return. .
“I have not received any word from President Biden or heard anything he is saying,” said Rep. Mark Takano (D-California). “Elon is the shot-caller, it’s pretty clear to me.”
As Republicans now try to sell a revamped bill before the funding runs out Friday night, the eleventh-hour debacle threatens to engulf the final days of Biden’s term while costing the administration some final policy priorities it had hoped to enact this year . terminate the agreement.
But as lawmakers searched for a path forward, no one seemed to be looking to Biden for answers — and the lame-duck president gave no indication he was willing to provide any.
“I haven’t talked to him,” Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the Democrats’ top appropriator, said of Biden, adding that she didn’t expect to do so in the near future. “I’ve spoken to the White House. I think their view is, ‘we had a deal.’
Biden aides and allies called the president’s silence over the past day and a half a strategic decision. Trump is now ready to take the blame for an eventual shutdown, they argued, harming him politically even before he takes office. And they argue that anything Biden says now would risk hardening the Republican Party’s resolve, making it harder to reach a deal.
Still, the president’s absence underscores a shocking reality that officials from both parties say has become clear since the November election: While Biden is still technically running the country, Trump — and increasingly Musk — are now the real captains.
“This is ridiculous,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) said of the sudden challenge of negotiating with multiple Republican leaders. “We negotiated it and they walked away from it because a billionaire shadow president, who doesn’t care where his rent check comes from or where his Social Security check comes from, suddenly decided he wanted to run the government.”
Biden spent all of Wednesday in Wilmington, Delaware, where he attended an early morning memorial commemorating the deaths of his first wife and daughter in a car crash more than 50 years ago. By the time Trump and Musk scuttled the deal lawmakers planned to vote on that afternoon, the White House had already put a lid on the door, signaling that Biden would not be seen or heard for the rest of the day.
The government’s only public announcement during the fight was a statement hours after the year-end bill officially collapsed, in which press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre criticized Republicans for abandoning the agreement.
“Republicans must stop playing politics with this bipartisan agreement or they will hurt hardworking Americans and create instability across the country,” she said. “A deal is a deal. Republicans must keep their word.”
White House staffers have since remained in close contact with Democratic Hill leaders on strategy and messaging, said a person familiar with the administration’s thinking who was granted anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. That message has essentially amounted to highlighting the widespread costs of a government shutdown — including billions in disaster relief funding — while emphasizing that Trump and Republicans created the crisis and are now responsible for solving it.
But as White House aides rushed to deal with the fallout, Biden remained at his Delaware home for most of Thursday, with nothing on his public agenda beyond his daily briefing. When he returned to the White House on Thursday evening, he did not comment on the financing discussions.
Biden had not spoken to Speaker Mike Johnson, and top House of Representatives Democrat Hakeem Jeffries declined to say whether he had had personal contact with the president in the past 24 hours — allowing only that he had been in “close contact with the government’.
The White House declined to detail how Biden spent his day and had no comment on the financing negotiations beyond Jean-Pierre’s initial statement.
As House Democrats emerged from a caucus meeting Thursday morning, they said there had been no discussion of Biden’s own views on the impasse, with several instead pointedly referring to Musk as “President Musk” and blaming it on Trump and Johnson to break the deadlock. .
“We need to let people at home know that it is very likely that we will face a government shutdown,” said Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-Texas). “The clock is running and I have no idea what Johnson’s plans are. I don’t know if anyone does that.”
Republicans said Thursday afternoon they had reached an agreement, although Democratic leaders quickly turned a blind eye to the revised proposal. If passed, the proposal would avoid a government shutdown during the holidays and allow the transition to proceed unhindered. But the resolution appears to have been reached without any direct intervention from the president.
Since Trump became president for a second time last month, some Democrats have been irritated by Biden’s low-key approach to his final months. complaining that a leadership vacuum has emerged as the party tries to prepare for Trump’s return.
That void is further emphasized by Trump’s all-consuming presence during the same period, with his minute-by-minute whims shaping the direction of the Republican Party and the news cycle on an almost daily basis.
But for at least a few days, as Republicans rushed to decipher Trump’s funding demands, Democrats seemed largely fine with Biden in the background. On Thursday, as Trump tried to shift the blame for a possible shutdown to the president, even Republicans struggled to keep up with the changing message.
“It’s pretty clear at this point it’s President Trump’s administration, and basically President Biden is no longer involved,” said Sen. John Barrasso, the chamber’s No. 2 Republican.
Members of both sides agreed that Trump was in charge — and whatever the consequences.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen,” said Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Michigan). It’s in the hands of the Republicans.”
Nicholas Wu and Eli Stokols contributed to this report.
