Leubsdorf: Pelosi up to challenge presented by Biden bills

And though it’s possible a small number of House Republicans will support the infrastructure bill — in the Senate, it got 19 of 50 Republicans — she’ll have to do it mainly by holding together her diverse Democratic caucus.

The Senate has already taken its first steps on both measures. The first House step came when it passed its version of the Senate’s $3.5 trillion budget resolution. It set the parameters for the so-called “reconciliation” measure through which the Democrats plan to fund Biden’s major domestic proposals.

Approval came after nine Democratic moderates said they wouldn’t vote for the budget resolution unless the House first passed the infrastructure bill. Pelosi reiterated that the House won’t consider the infrastructure measure until the Senate passes its version of the reconciliation bill — but she mollified moderates by agreeing to debate the infrastructure bill on Sept. 27, regardless of whether the Senate has acted.

She also said the House would work with the Senate to pass a reconciliation bill “that will pass the Senate.” After all, “it’s no use our doing a bill that is not going to pass the Senate.”

So Pelosi has her work cut out for her in appeasing both factions to pass the two Biden bills, not to mention other necessary legislation to fund the government and lift the legal ceiling on the national debt. But it’s a role for which she has plenty of experience.

In 2008, when most House Republicans voted against the bank bailout package the Bush administration devised to prevent a financial collapse, Pelosi put together the bipartisan majority that passed the controversial measure on the second try.

Later, she saved Obama’s signature health care bill after a Democratic defeat in a special 2010 Massachusetts Senate election cost the party the 60th vote it needed in the Senate. She had to persuade a reluctant House to accept the earlier Senate version.

Fortunately for the Democrats, recent polls show both the infrastructure bill and the spending package are popular with the American people. So too are their major ingredients, universal day care, paid family leave for all, free community colleges, extension of the child tax credit, expansion of Medicare, and increased taxes on corporations and the wealthy.

While many Democrats are critical of how Biden handled the Afghanistan withdrawal, they recognize this is their one chance to enact the domestic agenda they have touted for many years. Despite recent squabbles, their differences are largely ones of degree.

And they have the single most effective congressional leader of recent years — Nancy Pelosi — seeking one last major victory in what may well be her final term as speaker.