House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said Tuesday that if Republican efforts to cut federal spending resulted in the loss of government jobs, "so be it."
At a press conference Tuesday, Politico reports that Boehner sought to justify his controversial statement by anchoring it to a highly inflated estimate of the number of federal employees.
"Over the last two years since President Obama has taken office, the federalgovernment has added 200,000 new federal jobs," Boehner said, according to Politico. "If some of those jobs are lost in this, so be it. We're broke. It's time for us to get serious about how we're spending the nation's money."
As Politico points out, however, a Washington Post report from last year found that the number of executive-branch civilian workers had increased by only 20,000 since 2002, rising from 2.63 million to 2.65 million.
In the same press conference, Boehner also announced that the GOP would be willing to put all government programs "on the table" in the party's forthcoming budget proposal, which House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) later confirmed will include reductions in entitlement programs like
Except Today He Sounded Like A Bold U.S. President Who Knows Exactly Where He's Headed & Knows Exactly What To Do!
This Morning's White House Press Conference Also Proved That Unlike Most GOP Congressional Leaders & Some Democrats, Pres. Obama REALLY Does Care About The American People NOT Just Winning Another Campaign.
Obama Proved He's Sincere & NOT An Opportunist!
Attention GOP Leaders On Capitol Hill:
The Ball Is Now In Your Court!
But Beware Because American Voters Are NOT Stupid!
We Are Watching & Waiting.
If GOP Leaders Continue To Protect Billionaires & Millionaires By Playing Around With The American Economy & Continue To Filibuster Badly Needed Jobs Bills, They Will Pay Big Time In November 2012!
President Obama said Wednesday that he believed Republicans would concede to tax increases as part of a deficit reduction package in time to avoid a default on the nation’s debt, and voiced exasperation at the lack of progress in negotiations between the administration and Congressional leaders.
“Call me naïve,” he told reporters at a midday news conference in the East Room of the White House. “But my expectation is that leaders are going to lead.
He accused the Republicans, who last week dropped out of negotiations on the budget, of avoiding tough decisions and said they were playing a dangerous game that could significantly affect the nation’s struggling economy and capital markets and slow down private efforts to create jobs.
Mr. Obama repeatedly mocked tax breaks that he said were for “millionaires and billionaires, oil companies and corporate jet owners,” saying that voters would not look kindly on Republican lawmakers who defended such breaks at the cost of cuts in popular programs like health care, education and food safety.
But he did not explicitly say that he would reject a deal that did not eliminate such breaks, saying that he believed his adversaries would eventually agree to what Democrats have called a “balanced approach” that included trillions of dollars in spending cuts along with tax increases.
“If you are a wealthy C.E.O. or hedge fund manager in America right now, your taxes are lower than they have ever been. They are lower than they have been since the 1950s. And they can afford it,” Mr. Obama said. “You can still ride on your corporate jet. You’re just going to have to pay a little more.”
Questions about the looming debt deadline dominated the early part of the news conference, the first in several months for the president. But Mr. Obama was also asked about a series of other domestic and foreign policy issues.
On the American intervention in Libya, Mr. Obama defended his administration’s actions against Congressional critics who say the military activities there violate the War Powers Act, which requires Congress to give its formal approval.
“We have engaged in a limited operation to help a lot of people against one of the worst tyrants in the world,” Mr. Obama said, deflecting a question about whether he believes the War Powers Act is constitutional. “This suddenly becomes the cause célèbre for some folks in Congress? C’mon.”
On the issue of same-sex marriage, Mr. Obama declined to say whether he had changed his mind about his personal opposition. But he said New York’s decision to legalize same sex marriage was a “good thing.”
“That’s exactly how things should work,” he said, noting that different communities will come to different conclusions on the issue. “I think we are moving in a direction of greater equality, and I think that’s a good thing.”
Mr. Obama said his administration had done more than all of his predecessors combined to advance the rights of gay men and lesbians in America. Mr. Obama is scheduled to host a gay pride event at the White House on Wednesday afternoon.
But his remarks are likely to disappoint gay activists, who were hoping that Mr. Obama would say that his personal opposition to gay marriage had ended. In the past, the president has said his position is “evolving.”
On the economy, Mr. Obama sounded dire warnings about the consequences of delaying a resolution on the debt negotiations, and expressed exasperation with Republicans in Congress, saying they needed to “do their job” instead of blaming him for a lack of leadership.
In a remarkable display of frustration, Mr. Obama said he was “amused” by Republican comments that he had not offered a clear direction in the effort to cut the budget and increase the nation’s debt ceiling.
“They are in one week, they are out one week,” the president said, in a week that the House is out of session. “You need to be here. I’ve been here. I’ve been doing Afghanistan and Bin Laden and the Greek crisis. You stay here. Let’s get it done. All right, I think you know my feelings about that.”
Mr. Obama compared the lack of resolution in the debt talks to his daughters’ ability to get their homework done a day early.
“They’re not waiting til the night before. They are not pulling all-nighters,” Mr. Obama said. “They need to do their job. They need to go ahead and make the tough choices.”
Mr. Obama also mocked Republicans in Congress who have questioned whether the Aug. 2 deadline set by the Treasury Department for a default on the debt has been hyped for political reasons. He said the people making those claims would force the government to pick and choose who they would pay and who they would leave hanging.
“This is not a situation where Congress is going to say we won’t buy this car or we won’t take the vacation. They took the vacation. They bought the car. And now they are saying, maybe we don’t have to pay,” Mr. Obama said. “If the United States government, for the first time, cannot pay its bills, if it defaults, then the consequences for the U.S. economy will be significant and unpredictable. And that is not a good thing.”
In his opening statement, Mr. Obama said his administration was making efforts to spur job creation, but challenged Congress to pass bills that would help private companies add to their payrolls. He cited bills that would make it easier to get patents on inventions, expand loans to private businesses for hiring and pass long-delayed trade deals. “I urge Congress to act on these ideas right now,” he said.
On the debt talks, Mr. Obama said he was open to extending payroll tax cuts and other tax breaks that would help spur economic growth in the short term. “I think that it makes perfect sense for us to take a look at can we extend the payroll tax cut another year?” the president told reporters. “What we need to do is to restore business confidence and the confidence of the American people that we are on track.”
The president declined to comment on a controversial decision by the National Labor Relations Board to go to court to contest a decision by Boeing to build a nonunion plant in South Carolina. The decision by the independent agency has been criticized by Republicans as an infringement on right-to-work states and on the right of corporate managers to decide where to do business. The case is before a judge in Seattle.
But the president acknowledged the political sensitivities of the issue at a time when people are clamoring for the kinds of jobs that the Boeing plant would create. “If they are choosing to relocate here in the U.S., that’s a good thing,” Mr. Obama said. “What defies common sense is the notion that we would be shutting down a plant or laying off workers because labor and management can’t come to an agreement.”
Asked about concern in the military that the policy on how to handle terrorist suspects captured abroad was unclear, Mr. Obama said that his “top priority” was “to make sure that we are apprehending those who would attack the United States, and that we are getting all the intelligence that we can.”
But he said that “frankly, there are going to be different dispositions of the case depending on the situation.”
Pressed a second time on his personal views of same-sex marriage, Mr. Obama declined to elaborate, saying, “I’m not going to make news on that today” and telling the reporter who asked, Laura Meckler of The Wall Street Journal, “Good try, though.”
Later, Mr. Obama added: “I’ll keep on giving you the same answer until I give you a different one. And that won’t be today.”
President Barack Obama offered hope Thursday that a growing US economy may soon bring more jobs, as indicators pointed to a still-fragile recovery from the "great recession."
Signing into law a 17.6-billion-dollar measure designed to boost hiring, Obama said the economy was "beginning to move in the right direction," but admitted ordinary Americans were still bearing too great a burden from the economic crisis.
"Our economy is growing again and we may soon be adding jobs instead of losing them, the jobs bill I?m signing today is intended to help accelerate this process," Obama said in a signing ceremony in the White House Rose Garden.
Addressing employers who have been slow to create jobs amid continued economic uncertainty, Obama said: "If you hire a worker who?s unemployed, you won't have to pay payroll taxes on that worker for the rest of the year."
The legislation also includes infrastructure investments for items like highway construction and help for states to build schools.
As US unemployment levels hover near double digits, the White House has struggled to claw back some of the estimated eight million jobs that have been lost since the economy entered recession in December 2007.
On Thursday, the Labor Department reported new claims for unemployment insurance benefits dipped only marginally last week, with 457,000 Americans beginning to ask the government for help, down 5,000 from the previous week.
According to Ryan Sweet, a senior economist with Moody's Economy.com, employment is trending in the right direction, but the slow speed of change is "dashing any expectation that jobs will roar back."
For the Obama administration, speeding that recovery has become all the more urgent as the country faces midterm elections in November that will decide whether the president's Democratic Party keeps control of Congress.
But with the unemployment rate not expected to ease quickly, Obama and his treasury secretary, Timothy Geithner, have begun to focus on more modest indications of recovery -- pointing to increased hours put in by workers and firms shifting employees to a full-time schedule.
Geithner earlier this week said more than 100,000 new jobs would need to be created each month in order to dent the unemployment rate.
"It's about explaining to people that you are not going to take unemployment from 10.1 percent back to the good old days of five percent quickly," said Ted Gayer, co-director of economic studies at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank.
The midterm elections are also making it more difficult for Obama to pass more sweeping measures to spur employment.
Thursday's jobs bill that emerged from the poisoned political atmosphere in Congress is much smaller than some advocates had hoped, and Obama is pushing for more packages to spur job creation in the private sector.
The bill passed the Senate in a 68-29 vote, drawing support from 11 Republicans.
"I hope it is a prelude to further cooperation in the days and months to come, as we continue the work of digging out of this recession and rebuilding our economy in a way that works for all Americans," Obama said.
Today U.S. Sen. Richard Burr voted in support of a sweeping Jobs Bill estimated to provide $35 billion in Job-Related Tax Breaks and funding for Construction Projects.
Burr, a Winston-Salem Republican, recently boasted to GOP supporters that "it is impossible for any candidate to get to the right of me from an ideological standpoint," Barb Barrett reports.
But he was one of 11 Republicans to vote “yes” on the bill. The measure passed 68-29.
U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan, a Greensboro Democrat, also voted yes.
Burr said he supports the tax credits to get employers hiring jobless workers, and that he liked that this bill is paid for but cuts elsewhere.
"According to (the Congressional Budget Office), this bill will not add to the deficit because it is paid for by cutting elsewhere in government, a fact that makes it much different from last year’s "stimulus" package that I opposed," Burr said in a statement.
"This bill ultimately serves as an admission that last year’s stimulus package was a very expensive missed opportunity."
The bill would offer tax credits to employers hiring long-term jobless workers, and extends the federal bridge and road program.
Earlier this month Burr was one of 19 senators to vote against a $10 billion extension of Unemployment benefits. He was criticized in an online ad by the Democratic party for that vote, and for the fact that he didn’t show up for a critical procedural vote on the Jobs bill.
The jobs bill passed Wednesday now goes to President Barack Obama for his signature.
The bill allows employers who hire workers who have been unemployed for at least 60 days an exemption from paying their 6.2 percent payroll taxes for the rest of the year.
If the employees stay on at least a year, employers also would receive a $1,000-per-worker tax credit.
The bill also extends the federal bridge and roads construction program through the end of the year.
The Senate easily passed a $15 billion jobs bill on Wednesday morning amid hope that the measure could provide a blueprint for other items on President Obama's agenda.
The measure passed 70 to 28, with 13 Republicans joining 57 Democrats in support of the package. One Democrat, Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, voted against it.
"We've had so much gridlock," said Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), co-author of a key portion of the bill. Now, he said, "finally we have something" bipartisan to show the public.
The legislation is the first element of what Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) has said will be a multipart "jobs agenda." The measure includes a new program that would give companies a break from paying Social Security taxes on new employees for the remainder of 2010. It also carries a one-year extension of the Highway Trust Fund, an expansion of the Build America Bonds program and a provision to allow companies to write off equipment purchases.
The next stop is the House, where Democratic leaders are weighing whether to pass the Senate version or go to conference to reconcile it with the $154 billion jobs bill the House passed in December.
Wednesday's passage of the Senate bill was made possible by five GOP defections on a procedural vote Monday -- from two retiring senators from the economically depressed Midwest and three New Englanders seeking to maintain a foothold in a region where Republican officeholders have grown scarce in recent election cycles.
Freshman Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) grabbed the headlines, deciding on the first big vote of his new career to side with Democrats and the two GOP moderates from Maine, Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia J. Snowe.
Just days after Brown was greeted rapturously by attendees at the Conservative Political Action Conference, his vote on the jobs measure made Reid "very happy," the majority leader said. Reaction on the right was less complimentary.
One leader of the "tea party" movement has taken to calling the freshman "Benedict Brown," and disillusioned conservatives filled Brown's Facebook page with accusations that he was a "Judas" and a "sellout."
Democrats recognized early that Brown's vote could be in play, given the message of independence he projected during his special-election campaign to succeed the late senator Edward M. Kennedy (D). Reid called Brown to lobby him and was increasingly confident as the vote approached that the chamber's newest Republican would be willing to cross the aisle.
On Tuesday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) declined to criticize Brown for his vote. "The Republican Party represents all parts of the country, different points of view," McConnell said during a news conference. "We don't expect our members to be in lockstep on every single issue, and we're happy to have him here."
The votes of Collins and Snowe are frequently targeted by Democrats, and while neither senator said after the tally that she had been promised anything, both are eager for future jobs bills to include tax breaks and help for small businesses.
Retiring Sen. George V. Voinovich (R-Ohio) was more specific, announcing Monday that he had agreed to back the jobs measure after getting a "commitment" from Reid that the Senate would take up a long-term reauthorization of the highway bill in 2010.
Sen. Christopher S. Bond (R-Mo.), who is also not running for reelection, cited the bill's funding for transportation projects in explaining his decision to side with Democrats. During Monday's tally, Bond waited until the end to record his vote, not wanting to be the 60th "aye."
Democrats welcomed the result, suggesting that it could be a model for future endeavors.
"Several of those ideas were Republican ideas, so it's nice to see that there are Republicans who are willing to not follow blindly their leadership in their overall goal of filibustering," said Sen. Robert Menendez (N.J.).
Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), who chairs the Environment and Public Works Committee, said she had helped rally support for the measure from the transportation industry. She said the lessons of Monday's vote were that Democrats "should keep our bills very clear" and should make sure that "the American people who are involved in these issues get on the phone with their senators."
Republicans contend that the jobs bill's lessons are not applicable to health-care reform or other, more ambitious legislation.
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said the measure attracted support from his side of the aisle because it is modest.
"There are plenty of opportunities for bipartisan cooperation," he said. "Where we have trouble are these great big, comprehensive, 2,000-page, full-of-surprises, turn-the-country-upside-down pieces of legislation that cost so much. If the administration would stop biting off more than it could chew, I think we would have more progress."
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) said the level of crossover support in the future would be based on whether Reid is willing to allow Republicans to help shape bills and offer amendments on the floor.
"I think it's going to depend on the nature of the bill and on whether he's going to try to freeze out the minority party," Cornyn said, adding that he would advise against reading too much into Monday's vote: "Frankly, I just don't think it was all that big of a deal."
Scott Brown was in and out of the Senate chamber and had voted against his party before most of his colleagues had even arrived.
"It's a small step, but it's still a step," Brown told reporters after casting a procedural vote in favor of the Democratic jobs bill, bucking his party leaders and the strategy of opposition they have carried out since President Obama took office.
For Senate Democrats, it was much bigger step. Four Republicans followed Brown's lead, giving the jobs legislation 62 votes, two more than needed to cut off a GOP filibuster.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) thanked the newly-elected Republican from Massachusetts. "I hope this is the beginning of a new day here in the Senate. Whether this new day was created by the new Senator from Massachusetts or some other reason, I'm very, very happy that we were able to get this done. But there are some winners. Not any individual Senator, not Democrats or Republicans. The winners are small business people throughout this country."
Brown was followed by Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), who was followed by her home state GOP colleague Olympia Snowe.
Sens. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) and Kit Bond (R-Mo.), who are retiring, also backed the bill.
Voinovich's vote came after he was given an assurance from Reid that the surface transportation reauthorization bill that Voinovich prizes will be given high priority.
Voinovich, who was patted on the back by a grateful Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) after the vote, said that he could see himself working jointly with Brown and Democrats for the remainder of the term.
"I think he and I are going to do a lot of music together," said Voinovich. "My vote was reflective of what I thought made sense."
Voinovich didn't stick around for any loyalty lectures after his vote. "I have no idea," said Voinovich when asked what leadership thought of his vote. "I voted and took off."
Brown also said that he had "no idea" how the rest of his colleagues would vote. But it was good enough for him. "It's not a perfect bill. I would have liked broader and deeper tax cuts, but I was comfortable with that first vote," said Brown.
Of the 41 Republicans, 29 opposed the measure, while six skipped the vote. More Republicans skipped the vote than voted in favor.
Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), meanwhile, muddled the message of Democratic unity behind the jobs bill. He voted against it.
Voinovich wanted reporters to know about the terms he'd reached with Reid. After voting to break the filibuster, he handed out paper copies of statements to reporters waiting just off the Senate floor.
"I spoke to Majority Leader Reid prior to this vote and he assured me that he understands the importance of a surface transportation reauthorization bill," the statement reads. "I reiterated that it is the best way to create jobs, provide an immediate stimulus to the economy, rebuild our nation's infrastructure and reduce our carbon footprint. Leader Reid gave me his commitment that he will bring the reauthorization of a multi-year surface transportation bill to the floor for a vote this year. I look forward to working with Sen. Reid, Sen. Boxer and others to do so as soon as possible so we can put Americans back to work."
Shortly after, the White House released a statement by President Obama on the cloture vote:
The American people want to see Washington put aside partisan differences and make progress on jobs, and today the Senate took one important step forward in doing that. I'm grateful to the Democratic and Republican Senators who voted to support these investments in infrastructure and small businesses. This is one of many efforts we need to tackle our economic challenges, and we will continue to work with Congress on additional job creation measures. Jobs remain our top priority, and I look forward to working with members from both parties to get legislation signed, and the American people back to work.
EARLIER UPDATE -- 4:45 PM ET:
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) intends to challenge Republicans on Monday evening to prove that they are willing to do something -- anything -- to create jobs.
Reid will tout a trimmed-down jobs bill built with business tax breaks and other components that Republicans have backed in the past. His office put together an annotated catalog of the depth of Republican support for the various provisions in the bill.
The Senate previously considered a bill that was much more generous to K Street, though it had less to do with job creation. It was building bipartisan support when Reid stripped it down to a more targeted plan.
Reid said that the Senate will have the opportunity to take up other job-creation provisions in the future once this first bill passes. "The answer is not to do nothing," Reid says in prepared remarks. "It is to do something to create jobs, and then create more jobs, and then create more jobs after that. That's why this is not the only jobs bill or the last jobs bill we will bring to the floor."
"But, we can't do it alone," says Reid. "Republicans share the responsibility to govern. If they support this bill -- as they have in the past -- and if they join us now to pass it, we will do many, many more just like it. However, if they once again put partisanship ahead of people -- if they once again try to distract from the issue at hand -- they will only confirm their reputation as the Party of No. They will only confirm the American people's fears that Republicans refuse to do anything to help them."
Reid then makes a direct challenge: "So to my Republican colleagues, here is your chance. Show us you're serious about legislating. Show our constituents you're serious about leading. Show the skeptics that you know putting people back to work is far more important than putting points up on the political scoreboard."
If Republicans choose to filibuster the bill, Democrats will have a political weapon in their hands and will press the Party of No line forward.
"Most important, I ask my reluctant Republican colleagues to show those Americans who deserve a job to go to every the morning that we're willing to do our jobs this evening," Reid said. "It's remarkable that we have to hold a procedural vote on a bill that will create jobs. It will be regrettable if the minority prevents us from moving forward, from taking that first step, from giving millions of unemployed Americans the hope that tomorrow will be better than yesterday."
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said on Sunday that Republicans were willing to go along with Reid's earlier bill until he broke it up.
"What was a mystery to us is how the bipartisan bill got shelved. I thought it was moving along a bipartisan path. Many of my members were going to support it. And all of a sudden the majority leader decided to skinny it down," he said. "I mean, the point is he needs to bring up the bill. We need to have amendments and vote on it. I think -- in fact, Senator Bayh referred to this in his retirement announcement as one of his frustrations. I share his frustration. I thought that bill was on the way to being called up, amended, debate and voted on."
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid squeezed out a victory on a $15 billion jobs bill after a whirlwind day of frantic negotiations with Republicans.
Reid closed the deal with help from the man who cost him his 60-vote Senate supermajority: Massachusetts Republican Scott Brown.
The 62-30 vote to break a GOP filibuster avoided an embarrassing loss for the embattled majority leader, who faces a tough reelection battle in a state crippled by high unemployment and foreclosure rates. Final passage of the bill could come by Wednesday.
Reid also showed critics who have slammed him as a highly partisan, ineffective leader that he can break the gridlock in the Senate.
The Monday vote allows debate to proceed on the package, which has a range of tax credits and highway funds aimed at creating jobs. Winning passage of even a scaled-back jobs bill is critical for Democrats, who want to show they’re tackling unemployment, which stands at 9.7 percent.
“I hope this is a beginning of a new day here in the Senate,” Reid said immediately after the vote.
The vote came after weeks of tough negotiations that enraged not only Republicans but also moderate members of Reid’s own caucus.
As late as Monday afternoon, leadership aides and key senators were uncertain whether Reid would get the two Republican votes necessary to help the legislation clear a key procedural hurdle. In fact, Democrats were already preparing a Plan B if this vote failed and planned to relentlessly blame Republicans for falling short.
But Reid carefully worked the vote, and Democrats eventually won over Sens.Brown, George Voinovich of Ohio, Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine and Kit Bond of Missouri — enough votes to offset the loss of Nebraska Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson.
The Republicans who voted yes were drawn by a range of tax credits, and Voinovich and Bond specifically mentioned the highway funding in the bill.
The vote was not a sure thing until the very end, as Democrats continued their hard sell right on the Senate floor. Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) had an energetic conversation with Collins just minutes before she voted, which he then reported back to Reid. As soon as Kerry walked away, Collins was immediately visited by Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) and Republican leader Mitch McConnell.
Reid made personal overtures to Brown, who based much of his campaign on being an independent voice in Washington.
“This Senate jobs bill is not perfect. I wish the tax cuts were deeper and broader, but I am voting for it because it contains measures that will help put people back to work,” he said in a statement. “I hope my vote today is a strong step toward restoring bipartisanship in Washington.”
Brown refused to say whether he has solicited a specific commitment from Reid in exchange for his support but told reporters to “stay tuned” for a broad-based payroll tax deduction proposal.
Reid picked up Voinovich’s vote with a promise to take up the re-authorization of the transportation bill this year.
“I spoke to Majority Leader Reid prior to this vote, and he assured me that he understands the importance of a surface transportation reauthorization bill,” he said.
Collins called the process a “mistake” but said “the fact remains that the provisions of the bill were acceptable to me.” But she noted that she’d had no conversations with Reid about the bill.
And while this vote was a rare victory for Reid these days, there is still anger over how he handled the process.
Earlier this month, Reid killed a bipartisan jobs deal cut between Sens. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), infuriating Republicans who spent weeks in negotiations. Even Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), the author of a tax provision that became the heart of the Reid bill, voted against the smaller package.
“I don’t know why any senator would trust Harry Reid after he just killed a bipartisan compromise jobs bill,” said a Republican aide. “He basically dumped a must-pass measure with $45 billion in tax relief and said, ‘You know what, screw you guys.’”
Leadership aides say Reid dropped the Baucus-Grassley bill after intense lobbying from liberals in his caucus who doubted Republicans would actually vote for the measure when it came to the floor.
Democratic aides said Schumer called Reid during the blizzard two weeks ago and pushed him to drop the Baucus proposal in favor of the smaller bill. “I find Republicans a moving target here,” said Maryland Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin. “I think the leader would have had problems on any bill.”
The Baucus-Grassley bill was favored by moderates like Arkansas Sen. Blanche Lincoln and Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh, who liked the inclusion of tax extenders for small business, doctors and other corporations and agriculture subsidies.
But those same provisions made liberals wary of the package, which they worried would be characterized as heavy on lobbyist-sought provisions after initial press reports characterized the jobs bill as low on job-creation initiatives.
Reid also killed the compromise measure because McConnell would not commit to supporting the package and insisted on including amendments to the package, Democratic aides said.
Reid then started building his own coalition, working the phones — reaching out a few times to Brown. His efforts were complicated by the announcement that Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) would miss the vote to receive treatment for stomach cancer.
Minutes before the vote, Reid sought to maximize pressure on wayward Republicans, including Bond, saying on the floor that he had received a letter from the Missouri Department of Transportation saying that federal funds to bidders for transportation projects would be postponed “until further notice.”
“Missouri is not alone,” Reid said. “With this bill, we’ll create the right conditions for the private sector to start hiring again, and we’re doing so in the right places.”
With that, he had won Bond’s support and a 2-vote margin of victory. Reid said he expects the jobs bill to pass within two days.
Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh announced Monday that he will not seek re-election this November, an unexpected decision that hands Republicans an opportunity for a pick-up in a year when Democrats are already defending several open Senate seats.
Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh announced Monday that he will not seek re-election this November, an unexpected decision that hands Republicans an opportunity for a pick-up in a year when Democrats are already defending several open Senate seats.
Bayh, calling his decision a "very difficult, deeply personal" one, said he had been discouraged by the intense partisanship on Capitol Hill and that he had no interest in running in November solely "for the sake of winning an election."
"I love working for the people of Indiana," he said. "But I do not love Congress."
"After all these years, my passion for service to my fellow citizens is undiminished, but my desire to do so in Congress has waned," he said.
The two-term senator is known as a moderate Democrat. Former GOP Sen. Dan Coats had been planning to challenge Bayh in November -- but several Democratic sources said the decision appeared to be personal, not political.
A senior Obama administration official said Bayh called President Obama Monday morning to discuss the decision and indicated the senator had been considering retirement for awhile.
"The president has had several conversations with Senator Bayh about 2010. Bayh made his final decision this weekend, and it is personal, not at all political," the official said. "He is by nature a governor -- not a senator."
Bayh is a former Indiana governor and secretary of state. One senior Democratic source told Fox News that recent polling showed Bayh way ahead of Coats, and that the retirement must have been a personal decision. Bayh's staff said the latest polling showed Bayh ahead of Coats by 20 points.
One Democratic source said Bayh did not initially tell Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid about his decision Monday.
Sources told Fox News that Indiana Reps. Baron Hill and Brad Ellsworth are possible Democratic contenders to vie for Bayh's vacant seat.
The timing of the expected Bayh announcement creates a dilemma for Democrats, though, since the deadline for candidates' petitions to be submitted is Tuesday. That means Bayh's name could still be on the ballot in May's Democratic primary -- Democrats will have another opportunity to pick a candidate through a separate nominating process. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is considering whether it would be possible for a replacement to be named.
The retirement decision comes after Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., and Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., both announced their retirements in January. Democrats are trying to defend open seats in Delaware and Illinois as well.
Republican incumbents are abandoning seats in Florida, Kansas, Kentucky, Missouri, New Hampshire and Ohio. More Senate Democratic incumbents are considered vulnerable, however.
Signs of Bayh's discontent with the direction of the economy and with Washington could be seen in his votes over the past year.
He was one of only two Democrats two vote against the president's budget last year. Earlier this year, Bayh voted against his party when Reid tried to bring up a 10-year, $245 billion measure designed to stop massive cuts in federal reimbursements paid to Medicare doctors. And though he voted for the $787 billion stimulus bill, he was part of a group that axed $100 million from the original product produced by leadership -- what Bayh at the time called "silly stuff."
During healthcare negotiations, Bayh made it clear he did not trust that the bill would really hold down deficit spending. He worked with other conservative members to craft a package designed to rein in future costs. Bayh was also known to oppose the so-called "cap and trade" climate legislation proposed by the Obama administration.
Indiana Republican Party Chairman Murray Clark called the retirement a "game changer."
He told Fox News Radio the announcement comes as a surprise -- and said that while Democrats are "vulnerable," he considered Bayh to be "formidable" in November.
"Our field is pretty well established but theirs obviously has been thrown into disarray to say the least," Clark said.
If you think Pres. Obama and his White House staff didn't know Reid was going to pull this stunt, I have some swampland in Florida to sell you. In fact they probably secretly advised him to do it.
I guess this is Reid's way of appealing to the Democrats' Progressive base.
This proves Democrats don't really want Bi-Partisanship, they just want to control Republican leaders.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid led colleagues and the White House to believe he supported a bipartisan jobs bill — only to scuttle the plan as soon as it was released Thursday over concerns it could be used to batter Democratic incumbents, according to Senate sources.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) worked for weeks with Reid's blessing and frequent involvement to craft an $85 billion jobs bill, a measure that seemed destined to break the partisan logjam that has ground the Senate to a halt.
But as Baucus, Grassley and President Barack Obama were preparing to celebrate a rare moment of bipartisan Kumbaya on Thursday, Reid stunned a meeting of Senate Democrats by announcing he was scrapping Baucus-Grassley, replacing it with a much cheaper, more narrowly crafted, $15 billion version.
"Grassley and three to four Republicans would have voted for it, but all the other Republicans would have beaten the living s—t out of us [during the 2010 midterms], claiming the bill was too bloated," said a Democrat who supported Reid's decision, explaining the leader's logic.
Few felt as good about the decision: Republicans say the about-face will only add to an already poisonous partisan atmosphere, liberal Democrats think the bill is too small to do much good and the powerful negotiators of the bipartisan package were left embarrassed, demoralized and befuddled.
Aides to Baucus and Grassley said their bosses didn't know of Reid's decision when they unveiled their bill early Thursday – and expected it to have the leader's support.
"Sen. Reid's announcement sends a message that he wants to go partisan and blame Republicans," Grassley spokesperson Jill Kozeny said in a statement.
Antonia Ferrier, a spokeswoman for Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), who supported the bipartisan effort, said her boss was “deeply disappointed that the majority leader has abandoned a genuine bipartisan compromise only hours after it was unveiled in favor of business-as-usual, partisan gamesmanship.”
The White House also appeared to be caught off guard.
Moments before Reid announced his decision, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs released a statement, saying, "The draft bill released today by Sens. Baucus and Grassley includes several of the president's top priorities for job creation. [T]he president is hopeful that the draft language presented today will lead to a bipartisan Senate bill."
An unapologetic Reid told reporters Thursday that he'd made his decision before walking into the Democrats' Thursday lunch at the Capitol — a lunch that began just as the White House sent out Gibbs’s message.
"I made the decision before I came to the caucus," Reid said. "I just wanted to make sure that [members of the caucus] were supportive of what I was doing, and they are very supportive."
Reid spokesman Jim Manley later said that Reid had decided Thursday morning to push his package and had entered the lunch meeting with the intention of offering those gathered a choice between Baucus-Grassley and his own stripped-down bill.
"In the end, this is the direction the caucus decided to go," said Manley, who emphasized that many of the elements stripped from the bipartisan measure will be appended to later bills.
But people who were in the room painted a somewhat different picture, saying Reid's proposal was met with a mixture of confusion and outrage from senators upset about having their pet projects redacted – even after Reid promised to include their proposals in subsequent jobs bills.
California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein said she'd like more provisions increasing lending to small business and fewer tax cuts. And Iowa Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin argued passionately that, if lawmakers plan to extend corporate tax breaks, they should also extend employment insurance.
"[Reid's] trying to keep it simple," Harkin said emerging from the meeting, "but what I think ought to be in the package is unemployment insurance for one year."
And Baucus seemed puzzled by the change in course, particularly Reid’s decision to drop a package of tax extenders from the bill – a piece with strong bipartisan backing.
"Every senator has a different idea," said Baucus, emerging from the meeting. "There's been no decisions made."
But aides said that Reid was tired of constant lobbying from Democrats who wanted a bigger package and a long list of specific provisions included in the bill. Reid complained that the various requests had "watered down" the Democrats' job-creation message and wanted to present voters with a more streamlined bill.
Staffers added that the Nevada Democrat, fighting an uphill reelection battle, was frustrated that Republicans leaders, led by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), weren't fully committed to the bill.
In what appeared to be an attempt to isolate the majority leader, McConnell pushed to offer the Baucus-Grassley plan on the floor Thursday night, saying it would allow the Senate to work on unemployment insurance -- something left out of Reid's plan.
Aides involved in the negotiations say that Republicans in leadership and on Baucus's Finance Committee emerged from a meeting Tuesday saying they were close to agreement on the Baucus-Grassley bill -and that McConnell just needed to brief his caucus before signing on, a process slowed by a week of crippling snow storms.
"They came out and said we are in a good place we are just making sure we are talking to people," said a Republican aide. "All sides wouldn't have worked this long and this hard on this unless they were committed to making this happen."
Key Democrats and Republicans in the Senate reached a rare bipartisan agreement on Thursday on steps to spur job creation. But Democratic leaders said they would move ahead on only some elements as the two parties maneuvered to address both the struggling economy and voter unrest over gridlock in Washington.
Senator Harry Reid, the Nevada Democrat and majority leader, said he would take four core job-creating initiatives from the bipartisan proposal — including tax breaks for businesses that hire unemployed workers and increased public works spending — and seek to move those rapidly through the Senate.
“We feel that the American people need a message,” Mr. Reid said. “The message that they need is that we’re doing something about jobs.”
Yet his decision to embrace only portions of the bipartisan plan developed by Senators Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana, and Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, caught some lawmakers by surprise and threatened to undermine Republican support for the proposal even as members of Congress and the White House sought ways of working together across party lines after months of deep partisan division.
The White House projected Thursday that unemployment would fall this year by only a little, if at all, and would remain well over 6 percent until 2015.
While Mr. Reid stripped out of the bipartisan bill some tax breaks and other provisions intended to win Republican support, as well as special-interest provisions to win the backing of specific senators, the scaled-back package retained a combination of tax cuts and spending with the potential to win support from both parties.
The centerpiece is a payroll tax holiday that would waive the 6.2 percent Social Security tax for any employer who hires a worker who has been out of a job for at least 60 days. In addition, the bill would provide a $1,000 income tax credit for every new employee retained for at least 52 weeks.
It would also extend a tax break that would allow businesses to write off up to $250,000 in capital investments in 2010 rather than depreciating the costs over time, and reauthorize spending on road and transit programs through the end of the year. And it would allow state and local governments to receive a federal subsidy for a portion of the interest paid on bonds that finance public works projects.
The cost of the package laid out by Mr. Reid would be at least $15 billion over the next decade.
Hours before Mr. Reid’s announcement, Mr. Baucus, chairman of the Finance Committee, and Mr. Grassley, the senior Republican on the panel, had unveiled a broader, $85 billion agreement that also included an array of other provisions intended to generate support. They included extended unemployment benefits and health care for the unemployed as well as the renewal of an array of tax breaks that are due to expire.
That proposal had drawn backing from top Republicans and Democrats as well as the White House. Some of the authors of its provisions, including Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Republican of Utah, said they were left perplexed by Mr. Reid’s decision to scale it back and were now unsure they could support any bill.
“Needless to say, Senator Hatch is deeply disappointed that the majority leader has abandoned a genuine bipartisan compromise only hours after it was unveiled in favor of business-as-usual, partisan gamesmanship,” said Antonia Ferrier, a spokeswoman for Mr. Hatch, who helped write a provision suspending the payroll tax for companies that hire out-of-work people.
Democrats said Mr. Reid’s hand was forced by objections from rank-and-file Democrats that the measure was not focused tightly enough on job creation and included too many corporate tax breaks they viewed as concessions to Republicans.
At the same time, they said, Republican leaders had made no firm commitment to support the measure and they feared they could face conservative attacks for extraneous provisions like disaster aid for Arkansas and Mississippi.
“I would prefer a jobs bill that simply focuses on some specific job-creating initiatives,” said Senator Byron L. Dorgan, Democrat of North Dakota.
The dust-up over the jobs bill reflects the difficulties the parties are finding in working together even as lawmakers from both sides realize that voters want to see more cooperation and less confrontation. And both sides are making overtures.
Also on Thursday, Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut and chairman of the Banking Committee, and Senator Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee, said they would cooperate in trying to overhaul regulation of the financial services industry after earlier bipartisan talks seemed to falter.
The administration also continues to work to find Republican support for Mr. Obama’s plan to create a bipartisan commission to rein in the budget deficit. In an interview with Bloomberg Business Week published Thursday, the president said he would set no preconditions on steps the commission might propose to bring the budget back toward balance, even if it meant consideration of tax increases on the middle class — a step Mr. Obama vowed during the 2008 presidential campaign not to support.
At the White House, Robert Gibbs, Mr. Obama’s spokesman, encouraged lawmakers to find a way to work together.
“The American people want to see Washington put aside partisan differences and make progress on jobs,” Mr. Gibbs said.
Republicans were more receptive to the bipartisan jobs proposal than they have been to Democratic initiatives this year, but the leadership had not pledged its backing on the floor. On Thursday, before Mr. Reid pared back the bill, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, called it a work in progress.
The hesitation by top Republicans and the prospect that they would want to propose politically charged amendments made Democrats question whether the opposition was serious about cooperating and reminded them of Republican overtures on health care that later fell through.
Some Democrats noted that Mr. Baucus had spent months negotiating with Mr. Grassley on health care legislation only to come away empty-handed, ultimately costing the Senate valuable time on the issue.
Mr. Reid said he still hoped to win some Republican backing for the trimmed-down jobs measure since they had professed to support the individual provisions.
“Republicans are going to have to make a choice,” he said.
But Republicans said that it was Mr. Reid who had made a choice, the wrong one.
“The majority leader pulled the rug out from work to build broad-based support for tax relief and other efforts to help the private sector recover from the economic crisis,” said Jill Kozeny, a spokeswoman for Mr. Grassley.
Democrat Leaders (Harry Reid) keep the good, commonsense ideas from Republican Leaders and use those ideas to make the Democratic Party look competent.
After the legislation is drafted Congress tells the Mainstream Media that a Bi-Partisan bill will be passed.
What's wrong with this approach you ask?
Well after keeping good ideas from Republicans, Democrats than scale back the proposed Legislation and pass a much smaller version of the original legislation.
Slashing the bill is done so without notifying any Republican Leaders who shared their good, commonsense ideas which of course causes Republicans to complain or try to defect.
Once the Republicans start complaining or attempt to no longer participate, Democrats (actually Pres. Obama) than reports to Mainstream Media organizations (MSNBC & CNN) that Republicans don't want to work with Democrats and their still being uncooperative "Obstructionists".
This is the exact SAME sneaky, shady tactic Harry Reid used to draft the Health Care Bill when he brokered deals with Ben Nelson ("Nebraska Compromise") and Mary Landrieu ("Louisiana Purchase").
So in essence when Pres. Obama defined his version of Bi-Partisanship ("Bi-Partisanship is not just Democrats accepting all Republican ideas and rejecting Democrat ideas) he lied and flipped everything around to benefit his party.
Pres. Obama is using this familiar "Unity" strategy ("Keep your friends close and your enemies closer") to win.
Remember Pres. Obama is a Professional Politician without any real convictions.
His inexperience (18 months in Congress prior to his election) has been exposed in his inability to effectively govern our nation.
This is exactly why many, many American citizens are now suffering from Voters' Remorse.
He doesn't really care about helping other people as widely proclaimed on the campaign trail.
(Has anyone noticed he seems to care nothing at all about America's Middle Class, Low Income or Senior Citizens? All he does is give them Food Stamps and Welfare as if that's all they are worth.)
Apparently its more important for him to not offend Wall Street Bankers in order to keep those huge Campaign Donations rolling in, than assist citizens with keeping their homes from Foreclosures.
Pres. Obama will also throw ANYONE under the bus who gets in his way or disagrees with him.
If Republicans soften their edge or allow Pres. Obama to fool them into this fake Bi-Partisanship game, they will continue to lose.
If it looks like Bi-Partisanship but smells like a dirty "chicago politics" trick, believe me it probably is.
I caution Republicans not to abandon their Fiscal Conservative Principles and don't be fooled by wolves in sheep clothing or you will all be led astray to early political graves.
The president has invited congressional Republicans to sit down and talk through health care at a big "bipartisan summit" on Feb. 25. Some think it's a little late for such a conversation. After all, the Democrats have built their health care palace from the ground up, using only Democratic labor and Democratic input; they just can't get it to pass inspection. So general contractor Obama invites Republicans to debate the blueprints, and just the blueprints. Oh, and he wants to debate them, not change them. Not really.
"The president doesn't think we should start over," White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer explained. President Barack Obama himself has said he's committed to the existing bill(s) in the House and Senate. He just wants to hash out ideas with Republicans, in front of TV cameras, at a much-hyped summit because he thinks it would be good for America, or something. The Republicans can get whatever fixtures they want in the guest bathroom. Beyond that, they should just co-sign ObamaCare and shut up.
The best you can say about the effort is that it fits into the White House's universal answer to all of its problems: "We just need to explain to these confused Americans how we've been right about everything." To that end, the White House wants to use Republicans as a skeptical prop-audience in one last infomercial for the ShamWow of ObamaCare.
The worst you can say is that it's a cynical trap, designed to make the GOP look out of touch, ill-informed and ideological. Indeed, there's a bipartisan consensus growing in Washington that the whole thing is a setup. Obama is going to say "nice doggie" to Republicans right up until the moment he smashes them with a rolled-up, 2,000-page health care bill.
Liberals like the idea because they want the Republicans to get brained. They believe the GOP either doesn't have real ideas on health care, or that conservative ideas won't go over well with voters. They hope that Obama the law professor and community organizer will expose all of this, forcing the American people to come to their senses and support legislation they've been hearing about nonstop for a year. Again, liberalism is never wrong, it just has a problem explaining to the mule-headed electorate it's right about everything. Liberalism is always one more tutorial away from sunshine and lollipops for everyone.
Even so, the GOP should go.
Boycotting the event, as some have recommended, would rightly be seen as a sign of cowardice. Although there's no reason why the GOP has to play to the White House's script. Republicans should be respectful and serious, but they should also designate one or two representatives to speak for them. That's what Democrats did when they designated then-Senator Obama as their sole voice in the White House meeting on the financial crisis in September 2008. Sen. John McCain had conceived that meeting as a grand showcase for his statesmanlike leadership. That didn't work out too well for McCain, and there's no reason to expect that Mr. Obama's plan is any more foolproof.
That's the great irony in this whole stunt. Since he took office, Mr. Obama has been trying to use Republicans as one kind of foil or another. He started by castigating them as mindless drones of Rush Limbaugh. When Republican leaders opposed Obama's hyper-partisan stimulus, the president chastised them. "You can't just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done," he told them.
Then the White House and its supporters started casting the GOP - and the burgeoning tea party movement - as a Hieronymus Bosch scene of racists and gun nuts. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid compared opponents of ObamaCare to opponents of civil rights legislation. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi flatly questioned the patriotism of anyone who objected to Mr. Obama's policies. And so on.
At every turn, Mr. Obama's agenda became less popular, his support among independents cratered, his promises to change the tone in Washington looked ever more transparent, and his magic spell over the press weakened. Gallup now has Mr. Obama in a statistical dead heat against a generic Republican opponent, and the Democratic Party is in near total freefall, despite the fact it still has almost total dominion over Washington.
Now the president has another brilliant plan. Once again he has Republicans exactly where he wants them. Only someone who thinks Mr. Obama is one explanation away from total victory should think the GOP has reason to worry.
Unannounced, President Obama took to the lectern in the White House briefing room today to give a personal readout of his meeting earlier with congressional leaders of both parties.
"Despite the political posturing that often paralyzes this town, there are many issues upon which we can and should agree, he said.
It was more a plaintive plea than a political observation. His top legislative priorities are going nowhere and he's searching for a way to get them out of lockup.
In this 13th month of his presidency, he's anxious to pass a jobs bill and be seen addressing an unemployment rate that only last week declined from double digits. And his efforts to enact bills on energy, financial regulatory reform and especially health care are stuck in Congress despite the solid majority his party holds in both chambers.
He's appealing for a spirit of bipartisanship - urging Democrats and Republicans alike "to put aside matters of party for the good of the country."
It's a familiar refrain from U.S. presidents who can't get their way in Congress.
"We must put aside our political differences if we're ever to set our economy to rights," said President Reagan in 1982.
"It is time to put aside partisan rivalries and work together for our nation's future," said President Reagan in 1987 in trying to get Congress to enact deficit reduction
"We must put aside partisanship for the sake of our nation," said the first President Bush in 1990 in appealing for congressional cooperation on the budget.
"We must now put aside bitterness and rancor, move beyond partisanship," urged President Clinton in 1993 in trying to get Congress to pass his economic plan.
What these presidential appeals for bipartisanship always mean is: do it my way.
Mr. Obama said he "won't hesitate to embrace a good idea from my friends in the minority party." But he wants his way. He wants his energy policy enacted along with his jobs bill, his financial regulatory reform and his health care plan.
And if the opposition continues to block his objectives, he said he "won't hesitate to condemn what I consider to be obstinacy that's rooted not in substantive disagreement but in political expedience."
When a sitting president calls for bipartisanship by the opposition – he really means surrender. And if they block his proposals, its "obstinacy" and not political views they hold as strongly as he holds his.
Mr. Obama again said the American people are frustrated by the political stalemate in Congress. And he can be counted among the frustrated as well.
He wants to be seen calmly pursuing his legislative goals – and he told reporters today that his meeting with congressional leaders from both sides of the aisle went well. So well, in fact, he joked that the Senate leaders, Democrat Harry Reid and Republican Mitch McConnell had gone out to the South Lawn to make snow angels – together."
Sources: MSNBC, CBS News, Politico, NY Times, Baltimore Sun
The Obama administration's efforts to find common ground with congressional Republicans ran into two pockets of resistance Tuesday: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Minority Leader John Boehner.
At a closed-door White House session, Pelosi expressed skepticism over an administration proposal to offer tax breaks to businesses that create new jobs. And Boehner urged President Barack Obama to abandon much of the Democrats' current agenda on the ground that it's killing jobs by creating uncertainty in the markets.
The White House session with congressional leaders was supposed to be a step toward bipartisanship, with a focus on jobs. But Pelosi made it clear that there's disagreement, even among Democrats.
White House economic advisers Christina Romer and Larry Summers defended the administration's proposal to give employers a $5,000 credit for each new worker they hire as well as help with Social Security taxes.
Pelosi countered that no one she's consulted believes that the plan will actually lead to the creation of new jobs, sources said.
“She questioned the efficacy of it,” one Democratic aide said.
Another Democratic aide said that Pelosi has "some concerns about the tax side" of the jobs bill Senate Democrats are trying to pass but that she didn't say she'd refuse to move the bill through the House if it clears the Senate.
White House spokesman Bill Burton declined to discuss specifics of what was said in the meeting, but said, "There are a lot of ideas on how to create jobs from both Democrats and Republicans. What we're focused on is making sure that we move as quickly as possible to get a jobs bill passed and Americans back to work."
Pelosi's push back against the tax credit plan is the latest in a series of breaks with White House officials.
Most recently, she questioned Obama's proposal for a three-year freeze on discretionary nonsecurity spending, saying any freeze should apply equally to defense as well as domestic spending.
But the jobs bill is a particularly sore spot. The House passed a $154 billion jobs package in December but that bill has been cast aside in the Senate, where Majority Leader Harry Reid needs to win support from moderate Democrats and persuade at least one Republican to cross over on a cloture motion.
Pelosi spokesman Brendan Daly said Tuesday that his boss is "a very strong supporter of this president," and that she thought Tuesday's meeting was "very productive."
"She's glad the president called it. She knows Democrats have to work with Republicans to pass this critical jobs bill," Daly said.
Sources said Obama spent part of Tuesday's meeting tangling with Republican leaders, accusing Boehner and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of wanting to "kill" his top domestic priorities.
Boehner told the president that Democrats should "dispose of" their plans for health care reform and a cap-and-trade bill as well as other initiatives because the uncertainty surrounding them is dragging down the economy.
Sources said Obama was clearly irritated and told Boehner: “You just want to kill all of these bills."
Boehner shot back, saying, “No, you are wrong," and said his party really did want to work with Obama in a bipartisan fashion.
Obama complained that his administration isn't getting enough credit for what it's done to improve the economy, including providing increased Medicaid aid to the states.
When the subject turned to reducing the deficit, sources say Obama tried to take McConnell to task for supporting a bill to create a bipartisan debt-reduction commission and then voting against it.
McConnell said he raised the issue of a fiscal commission before Obama was inaugurated last January but that the president didn't respond for more than a year — just before Reid brought the measure to a vote.
Obama pushed McConnell and Boehner to appoint members to a debt commission he plans to create through executive order, which he said would be based on the failed bipartisan plan.
Boehner laid out a series of concerns over the plan, saying it would lead to kicking the can down the road and that the panel's recommendations should be voted on before an election rather than after one.
Neither McConnell nor Boehner committed to appointing members to the commission, saying they needed to see the details of Obama's proposal first.
Boehner said that Obama should use his authority to rescind spending — and send such a proposal to the Hill, pledging GOP cooperation if Obama did so.
But the main focus of the meeting was on ways to reverse the nation’s 9.7 percent unemployment rate.
Obama made a pitch for a bipartisan jobs bill that would include funding for infrastructure, a cut in capital gains tax and the hiring tax credit, sources said.
Pelosi — along with the rest of the Democrats, indicated that she supported more infrastructure spending, including "Greening" efforts throughout the country.
According to sources, Boehner agreed that cutting capital gains was a good idea but raised concerns about whether it was workable, pushing for it to be lowered from 10-15 percent to 5-10 percent.
McConnell called for bipartisan support on four issues that Obama mentioned in his State of the Union address: trade, offshore drilling and expanding nuclear production and clean coal technology.
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