Will any of these steps help the Democrats, or is it already too late? Dropping the filibuster now could turn out to be self-sabotage. The party that controls the White House typically loses seats in midterm elections—more so when the president’s approval rating is underwater, as Biden’s is at the moment. Democrats can’t afford to lose any seats in the Senate next year. So the dilemma they face is that if they get rid of the filibuster now, they could find themselves in the minority without the protections the rule affords. Biden could veto legislation coming from a new Republican majority, but 2024 isn’t far off and Democrats could lose the White House.

It is far from certain that the infrastructure bill’s passage will make a difference in the midterms. Come fall 2022, voters aren’t likely to be drinking water from gleaming new pipes and gliding to work on newly widened roads. In 2009, President Barack Obama signed a nearly $800 billion stimulus package, part of which was set aside for “shovel-ready” infrastructure projects. A year later, he would concede, “There’s no such thing as shovel-ready projects.” Democrats lost a whopping 63 House seats in the 2010 midterms, smashing a 70-year-old record.

As my colleague Ronald Brownstein wrote last month, history shows that it is “extremely difficult for presidents to translate legislative success in their first year into political success” in their second. Early legislative victories can help a president’s reelection bid but won’t necessarily forestall midterm-election losses. All of which suggests a Democratic midterm wipeout is almost unavoidable. (Bedingfield is more optimistic: “There’s plenty of time to talk to the American people about what we will have been able to achieve with the ‘Build Back Better’ agenda.”)