Biden turns to state to begin pitch for huge spending plan

In the closing days of his presidential campaign, Joe Biden swung through the Georgia town where Franklin Delano Roosevelt coped with polio, making the case that government can be a force for good. Now, 100 days after taking office, Biden has returned to the state trying to sell voters on his ambitious vision.

The president hoped on Thursday to rally supporters behind his $4 trillion plans to rebuild America’s aging infrastructure and vastly expand the government’s social safety net. As the nation takes steps to move past the devastating pandemic, he argues that now is the time for the government to spend more on its citizens and raise taxes on the extremely wealthy to cover the cost.

The Georgia trip is part of an effort to gain momentum for the massive - and expensive - agenda Biden articulated during his first address to a joint session of Congress. It’s a dramatic shift from nearly four decades of politics in which leaders from both parties have spoken of a need to contain government

“In another era when our democracy was tested, Franklin Roosevelt reminded us-In America we do our part,” Biden told lawmakers Wednesday night. “That’s all I’m asking. That we all do our part.”

There’s special significance in Biden’s decision to make Georgia his first stop after the address. He was the first Democratic presidential contender to carry the state since Bill Clinton in 1992.