Once rivals, Biden and Sanders are now partners in power

Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders have forged an unlikely yet understandable partnership

WASHINGTON -- Talkers both, Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders stayed for an hour in the Oval Office, just two former rivals for the White House now acting as potential partners, negotiating a compromise both could live with. The centrist president listened as the liberal senator spoke. Sanders passionately made his case that Biden’s big infrastructure investment should go even bigger — and include his own longtime goal of dental, hearing and vision benefits for older Americans on Medicare. The president gave his full backing, according to a senior White House aide and another person familiar with the private session, who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe a private meeting. The deal was the product of mutual trust and common interest — notably to help the working class, but also to show that government can work and perhaps to restore some faith in democracy after the turbulent Trump era. “We are making progress in moving forward with the most consequential piece of legislation passed for working people since the 1930s,” Sanders told The Associated Press a few days later, as Biden made his way to Capitol Hill to rally senators on the plan.