The lower house of Congress passed the legislation on Friday after its final passage in the US Senate last Sunday. It will now head to Biden for his signature. White House officials on Thursday touted the passage of the bill by Congress as a major achievement for Biden and a sign of his determination to implement what has been an ambitious economic agenda in a tough political environment, despite numerous setbacks in negotiations on the Capitol. They also expressed confidence that it could boost the president’s low approval ratings ahead of November’s midterm elections. “[Biden] he has a long history of being someone who has been knocked down and just picked himself up and stuck with it. And that happened here. And that’s important for the country to see,” a White House official said. Another added: “This is the Biden vision. These are Biden’s priorities. . . That’s because of President Biden’s leadership and because he paved the way for this to happen.” The $700 billion legislation is known as the Deflation Act — even though its price-lowering effect is not expected to be felt for several years and will be negligible in the short term.

It includes a huge boost to clean energy incentive funding, while allowing the government to negotiate the price of some drugs for the elderly, as well as tax measures including a 15 percent minimum tax rate and a 1 percent excise tax on corporations. The bill also boosts funding for the Internal Revenue Service to increase the tax burden on the wealthy, which has drawn sharp criticism from Republicans. In the Senate, the legislation received no support from Republicans and passed by a vote of 51 to 50, after Vice President Kamala Harris provided the tiebreaker. In the House, the legislation is also expected to receive little or no support from Republicans. The eventual passage of Biden’s flagship economic legislation was overshadowed this week in US politics by the FBI’s search of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home in Florida as part of the investigation into the White House’s handling of classified information. The Biden administration has tried to distance itself from the raid, saying the Justice Department operates independently and that the president is focused on other issues of concern to Americans. “The president was not informed. . . he didn’t know it. No one in the White House was alerted,” White House press secretary Karin Jean-Pierre told reporters Wednesday. “[Biden] believes in the rule of law, in the independence of Justice Department investigations, that those investigations should be free from political influence. And he has made that commitment as president.” Biden’s batch of good news was also boosted by comforting economic data. Last week, the Labor Department reported that job growth picked up in July, defying fears of a sharp slowdown or even a recession – and this week data showed that inflation started to ease on lower gas prices. But polls continue to show Americans widely disapprove of his handling of the economy.

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