evidence: The president’s gesture of support underscored the political reality that is driving the tense negotiations on Capitol Hill: In the battle for ideological supremacy in the Democratic Party, the progressives have already won. Biden was indeed a proud moderate during his three and a half decades as a senator, but he has fallen in firmly with the progressives as president. He’s embraced the agenda championed by the likes of his former rivals Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren—tackling climate change; creating a new child-care tax credit; expanding the government’s role in health care; endorsing universal pre-K, free community college, and paid family leave—and made it his own. The moderates in the House and Senate are balking at the size and scope of Biden’s plan, and, still, the president is siding with the progressives. He used last week’s meetings to reassure lawmakers like Jayapal and to pressure centrists such as Senators Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, who have opposed the $3.5 trillion price tag of the Democrats’ proposal but have yet to make a counteroffer of their own.