WASHINGTON – After a week of legislative successes for President Barack Obama, Republicans seized on one asterisk: his inability to line up support from their ranks.
As Obama heads into his second full week in office, members of both parties are waiting to see whether he will regard this as the failure that some have made it out to be – and how much he is willing to alter his approach if he does.
Both the House’s passage of an $819billion stimulus package and the Senate’s passage of a children’s health insurance bill broke along party lines, with the stimulus bill failing to receive any GOP votes. The result came despite Obama’s meetings with Republicans on Capitol Hill, his invitation to their leaders for co*cktails at the White House, and the bipartisan guest list for his Super Bowl party last night.
As early as today, he is expected to name a third Republican to his Cabinet: Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire as commerce secretary.
The White House remains eager to broaden the consensus around the stimulus package. With the Senate taking up the plan this week, there are signs that Democrats will continue their efforts to get at least a handful of Republicans on board by expanding the tax cuts included in the package and possibly refocusing the spending around shorter-term stimulus instead of the longer-term priorities of Obama and congressional Democrats on health care, energy and other areas.
The White House did not view the rejection of Obama’s initial bid at fostering bipartisanship as a stinging disappointment. Even as Obama was unable to pick up their votes, he was left with many Republicans praising his outreach.
Judging by Obama’s record, it is this tone of mutual respect that – at least for now – he may be after as much as votes on bills he could pass without significant GOP backing.
While many Democrats on the Hill are anxious about the concessions that may yet be on the horizon, some Republicans are wondering whether Obama’s outreach may not extend to agreeing to the compromises they want.
“We got the sense that he was very genuine,” said Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn. But “if he comes and meets with us like that and it doesn’t have an impact, it begins to hurt his credibility.”
The uncertainty over just how the new president defines bipartisanship traces back to the campaign trail. When Obama called for an end to “broken and divided politics,” his Republican opponent, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and others contended that there were few instances in Obama’s career when he had made major concessions that upset fellow Democrats to reach agreement with Republicans.
But this, said some who have worked with Obama, overlooked his intent. To Obama, they said, fixing “broken politics” is less about making concessions just for the sake of finding common ground and more about elevating the debate – replacing cynical gamesmanship and immature name-calling with intellectually honest arguments and respect for the other side’s motives.
Obama’s bipartisanship “was as much about style, collegiality and civilness as it was actual movement on issues,” said state Sen. Kirk Dillard, who was Obama’s closest Republican ally in the Illinois legislature. Obama did compromise on major bills on ethics and the death penalty as a state senator, but there were limits, Dillard said.
“He always listened to the other side and would move to some degree, but his bipartisanship was clearly about the tone and the way you treat one another ... and trying to understand the other side – and not necessarily all about caving in,” he said.
Obama himself emphasized tone more than the results of congressional roll calls last week.
“We’re not going to get 100 percent agreement and we might not even get a 50 percent agreement, but I do think that people appreciate me walking them through my thought process,” he said.
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs noted that the stimulus bill still has several rounds of voting in front of it, in the Senate and then again in both chambers after a conference committee hashes out differences – and he predicted that efforts to reach out to Republicans would yet pay dividends.
But Gibbs added: “This can’t be a one-way street. The president has done a lot to reach out. I think the American people will understand that message quite clear.”
As Republicans see it, the main obstacle to Obama’s call for greater cooperation is the Democratic congressional leadership.
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, experienced the contrast between Obama’s outreach and hardball Capitol Hill politics three days into the president’s term.
Rahm Emanuel, Obama’s chief of staff, had invited Hatch to his White House office, and 45 minutes into the meeting, an unexpected guest happened to drop by: Obama. He ushered Hatch to the Oval Office, where Vice President Joe Biden, a longtime friend of Hatch’s, joined them for a private chat.
“They know I’m somebody you can work with,” Hatch said later.
But when Hatch returned to the Capitol, his mood turned. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., had refiled a bill expanding children’s health insurance in a form that differed from a bipartisan bill that Hatch had co-authored with Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass. The new bill included a controversial expansion of coverage for the children of legal immigrants who are not citizens.
Hatch spent the week trying to change the legislation, to little avail. The bill passed Friday, with Hatch and all but nine Republicans opposing it.
“That’s the perfect illustration, I think, of a lack of faith,” Hatch said, calling the move on the legislation a “pure partisan” stunt.
