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Louisiana Congressman Troy Carter says the president’s decision to put his $1 trillion infrastructure bill on hold and to relink the legislation to his $3.5 trillion social proposals is the correct strategy.

“The basic take away is that we’re closer than many think,” Carter said Friday about the two cornerstone bills of the Biden administration in the moments after leaving a Democratic Caucus meeting on Capitol Hill with President Joe Biden.

The U.S. House debated the bipartisan infrastructure bill late into Thursday night before House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, decided to postpone the vote.

House Republican leaders, including Minority Whip Rep. Steve Scalise, R-Metairie, had lobbied against the infrastructure bill on which U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-Baton Rouge, had served as a key negotiator. The legislation also was opposed from the other side of the political spectrum as left-wing Democratic representatives feared losing leverage to moderates in drafting the social policy bill, which some say is becoming too expensive, if the infrastructure measure passed independently.

“The president said, ‘Rather than look at that number, let’s look at the programs and determine what is important to you,’” Carter recalled, adding that he needs both infrastructure and social policy programs.

The state’s only Democratic congressman, Carter's 2nd Congressional District starts in New Orleans East, then links just about every Black majority precinct along the Mississippi River into north Baton Rouge.

Noting that his constituents rely on the petro-chemical plants the line the river for jobs, they also suffer from high rates of cancer. Parts of the social policy legislation would help companies better comply with environmental regulations. But the district also needs a passenger rail link between Baton Rouge and New Orleans that can efficiently deliver tens of thousands of workers to the riverside manufacturers, many of which are accessible landside over narrow, winding roads.

"I'm a realist. I was a senator a long time. I know how legislation gets done,” said Biden, carrying a newspaper and a cup of coffee Saturday morning as he boarded Marine One for a short trip to his personal home in Delaware.

“There is no reason why both these bills couldn’t pass independently except that there are not the votes to do it that way,” Biden said, adding that he’s going to hit the road to educate voters on what are included the bills.

“The American people are relying on Congress to get both the bipartisan infrastructure bill and the Build Back Better plan done,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement Saturday. “These bold proposals will create millions of good-paying union jobs, make overdue investments in our nation’s infrastructure, lower the cost of childcare, eldercare and education, and take essential steps to address the climate crisis. He left the meeting yesterday with the firm belief that there was a shared commitment from across the Democratic Caucus to deliver for the American people.”

Let the record show that both Louisiana representatives who are part of the Republican congressional leadership voted against aid to help the state recover from a string of disasters.

And also against keeping the government open. Because what’s the point of having a functioning government anyway, if you’re not going to put it to work for the people you represent?

Last week’s headline for Louisiana communities struggling to recover from a crushing yearlong four-hurricane stretch is that Congress finally approved long-sought community development block grants to help rebuild. The aid, less than what’s needed but at least something, was tacked on to a last-ditch measure to avert a partial government shutdown.

But a part of the story — one that shouldn’t be swept under the rug once the ribbon cuttings commence — is that House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson, and Republican Conference Vice Chairman Mike Johnson, R-Benton, deserve no credit for bringing the money home. This even though both signed a delegation letter to the Biden White House arguing that “without substantial and robust emergency appropriations from Congress … Louisiana families will continue to languish as a result of these devastating storms.”

Apparently they’ve got other priorities besides those languishing Louisiana families.

Having other priorities is kind of a thing these days, particularly with a number of big partisan fights coming to a head at once. That Democrats are narrowly in charge of Congress and also hold the presidency, and that they’re more inclined to spend federal money even for red states, seems to complicate things for Louisiana’s mostly Republican members.

U.S. Rep. Clay Higgins, R-Lafayette, voted for the bill, but only after having done little to expedite aid for areas in his district decimated by the Category 4 Hurricane Laura and a string of subsequent disasters.

So did U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy, who sometimes joins with Senate moderates to back important legislation by Democrats, and his Senate colleague John Kennedy, who rarely does. Both, though, opposed an earlier version of the aid attached to a Democratic bill to suspend the debt limit (Cassidy later explained in an online town hall with The Advocate and The Times-Picayune that they held out until they knew efforts to overcome a GOP filibuster would fail, which isn’t a very compelling reason). Also voting in favor were U.S. Reps. Garret Graves, R-Baton Rouge, and Julia Letlow, R-Start, along with the delegation’s only Democrat, U.S. Rep. Troy Carter of New Orleans.

Before anyone gives all those Republicans credit for putting their constituents above party, consider what’s happening with the separate stalled $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill, which includes billions for roads, bridges, coastal restoration, storm defenses, and high-speed internet.

Cassidy helped write the bill and pass it through the Senate with votes to spare — although without Kennedy’s support — and he makes a strong case that its passage would be “tremendous” for Louisiana. And yet Scalise has been whipping fellow House Republicans to vote against it. So far, most are falling in line, including every member of Louisiana’s GOP delegation.

They make a disingenuous case that Louisiana wouldn’t be guaranteed its fair share, which Cassidy effectively answered during the town hall by pointing to numerous line items that are specifically geared toward areas prone to natural disasters. “Hello, that’s us,” he said at one point.

They also claim that President Joe Biden would somehow shortchange Louisiana in favor of his political allies, even though a CNBC analysis of the bill projects higher per person spending here than in quite a few blue states. Particularly disappointing is Letlow, who campaigned to bring broadband to her rural district but says she’ll vote no even though the bill dedicates $65 billion to the cause.

“When that is coming from a Democratic majority and an administration, from what I have witnessed in Washington, I just don’t trust it right now,” she told KNOE.

Of course, one way to make sure your priorities are included is to engage, as Cassidy did.

Instead, opponents are sitting back and watching Democrats fight among themselves over whether to pass the infrastructure bill without also approving a larger, more divisive social spending package, even as — or more likely because — their own near-blanket opposition gives progressive holdouts leverage against Democratic moderates.

I’m sure it’s a lot of fun for them to watch their political adversaries tear one another apart and endanger their own president’s agenda.

Maybe not so much fun for their constituents, who could really use all the improvements the bill promises.

U.S. Rep. Troy Carter of New Orleans, Louisiana's only Democrat in Congress, believes a compromise to close the deal on infrastructure and social spending bills is within reach.

President Joe Biden met with House Democrats Friday afternoon in an attempt mend a fracture within his own party that threatens to derail both the bipartisan $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill and the more partisan $3.5 trillion social spending bill.

"We're on the cusp of doing somethng unprecedented for America," Carter said in an interview with USA Today Network after the meeting with the president. "I think the takeaway from the meeting is that we're closer than we think and that the president is very engaged and understands all angles of the discussion.

"We're close to a framework to get as much for the American people as possible."

Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had scheduled a vote on the infrastructure bill on Thursday, but the party's most liberal members threatened to derail it without a commitment that the Senate will pass the $3.5 trillion bill to provide free community college, universal pre-K and other increases in safety net entitlements.

Biden resisted imposing any deadlines on votes when he emerged from Friday's meeting with Democrats.

"We're going to get it done," Biden told reporters. "It doesn't matter if it's in six minutes, six days or six weeks."

Democrats hold such slim majority margins in the Senate and House that they can't afford any defections. Republicans in the House are unified against both bills.

The infrastructure bill, which would direct an additional $6 billion to Louisiana for roads and bridges in the first five years of its rollout, won bipartisan support in the Senate. Louisiana Republican U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy was one of its authors and champions.

But moderate Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona have said they can't vote for the social spending bill without a smaller price tag than $3.5 trillion. Manchin said this week he could support $1.5 trillion.

Carter isn't among the House Democrats who are insisting that the $3.5 trillion bill pass before he would vote in favor of the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill.

"I'm going to fight for the whole enchilada, but I'm not coming home empty-handed," Carter said.