It was as if House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy hadn’t just ousted a top Republican for accepting President Biden’s win. As if Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell had not recently declared his “100 percent” focus on stopping Biden. As if House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had never accused GOP lawmakers of a “reckless . . . assault on the Constitution.”
On Wednesday — shortly after McCarthy (R-Calif.) led the removal of Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) from her leadership post, and shortly before he informed donors that “Corrupt Joe Biden” was “STILL planning to push his radical Socialist agenda” — Congress’s four top leaders held a businesslike meeting with Biden in the Oval Office on “issues of mutual agreement.”
It was Biden’s first White House get-together with the so-called Big Four. Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) sat politely on one couch; McConnell and McCarthy courteously occupied another. A bouquet of flowers sat on a coffee table between them. All four wore face coverings, in deference to White House requests that those who came to the Oval Office meeting wear N95 masks.
It was a test of sorts as to whether the government could function in somewhat normal ways amid unprecedented political dynamics. The participants emerged from the 90-minutes-plus session saying it was cordial, with general agreement on the need to invest in American infrastructure — making for a strange juxtaposition with the rest of the day’s maneuvering.
Privately, they exchanged testy words over topics like tax hikes and electric cars, and leaving questions over how committed the parties really are to working together.
Biden did his best to suggest he was unfazed by Cheney’s demotion, essentially for recognizing the validity of his presidency. Asked by reporters whether he could still trust and work with McCarthy, Biden responded quickly, “Yes.”
And asked how he could find a compromise with Republicans, he answered wryly, “Easy. Just snap my fingers — it’ll happen.”
McCarthy, for his part, sought to distance himself from claims that Biden’s win was fraudulent.
“I don’t think anybody is questioning the legitimacy of the presidential election,” McCarthy said, even though he twice voted to overturn the election results and has repeatedly defended Trump, who openly says the election was stolen. “I think that is all over with. We’re sitting here with the president today.”
It was a remarkable coming together of six figures — Vice President Harris joined the group — with intertwined histories and complicated backstories. McConnell and McCarthy are battling for the future of their party, representing different wings and divergent approaches on how closely to hew to Trump. The former president regularly insults McConnell, who has blamed Trump for the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol. McConnell has a long-lasting relationship with Biden, but last week said he would devote “100 percent” of his focus to stopping him — later clarifying “depending on what it is.”
Pelosi and Schumer are each working with extraordinarily narrow majorities, while fighting historical trends that suggest they could lose a significant number of seats — and control of their respective chambers — in the 2022 elections.
Amid this thicket of partisan and intraparty tensions, Biden has proclaimed his desire to bring the factions together — an assertion many Republicans view with skepticism, saying he has governed more like a divider than a unifier.
“When I ran, I said I wasn’t going to be a Democratic president, I was going to be a president for all Americans,” Biden said at the start of the meeting. “And what the bottom line here is, we’re going to see whether we can reach some consensus on a compromise on moving forward.”
It quickly became clear that wouldn’t be easy.
The Biden administration has set a Memorial Day deadline for achieving “progress” on the president’s next slate of proposals, which entails some $4 trillion in spending. The White House has split that into two proposals, one that would spend $2.3 trillion on infrastructure and another that would allocate $1.8 trillion for child care, education, and paid family leave.
The White House has been most focused on finding agreement with Republicans on the size of the infrastructure package, largely leaving aside the more divisive debate over how to pay for it. Biden has proposed increasing taxes on corporations and wealthy individuals, partly undoing a major tax-cut package that Republicans passed in 2017 under Trump.
McConnell and McCarthy flatly ruled that out on Wednesday.
“We’re not interested in reopening the 2017 tax bill,” McConnell said after the meeting. “We both made that clear to the president. That’s our red line.”
McCarthy echoed his concerns, adding that Republicans would only support a package of traditional infrastructure projects like roads and bridges, not an expansion of social programs.
“There’s an opportunity we could work together on infrastructure, as long as it’s not anything about tax increases and it’s dealing with infrastructure,” he said.
Inside the Oval Office, the two sides sparred over that question of what can fairly be considered infrastructure spending. While Biden’s plan broadly defines infrastructure — including such items as home health care for older and disabled Americans — Republicans have tried to narrow the scope to focus on physical projects.
“We first have to start with the definition of ‘What is infrastructure?’ ” McCarthy said. “That’s not home health. That’s roads, bridges, highway, airports, broadband. Those are the places we could find common ground and work together.”
Pelosi dismissed the Republicans’ position, especially regarding the 2017 legislation. She called it a “tax scam” because in her view it benefited wealthier Americans while purporting to help the middle class.
“He considers it sacrosanct. We have a different set of values,” Pelosi said of McConnell. “Does it seem right to you that as we build the infrastructure of America where the commerce of America is promoted, where success is garnered by big corporations in America . . . 50 of them didn’t pay any taxes last year?” Pelosi said.
She added, “Why should working families be underwriting the infrastructure — the roads, bridges and the rest — that that commerce travels over?”
Still, Pelosi said that while she went into the meeting knowing she could pass the legislation through the House relying on Democratic votes if need be, she emerged with more optimism about the prospects for a bipartisan package.
“But we’ll see,” she added. “We’ll see.”
One point of contention inside the Oval Office was an electric-car proposal written by Schumer and included in Biden’s infrastructure plan. As both Schumer and the president underscored the importance of passing the measure — which aims to make every U.S.-made car electric by 2030 — Republicans pushed back, according to a person familiar with the meeting, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to disclose a confidential conversation.
While much of the meeting was focused on infrastructure — with Biden warning that other countries are making investments and the United States risks falling behind — Republicans said they also raised alarms about inflation, the border and gas shortages.
The White House views this week as crucial to determining the path forward, and whether there is enough of an appetite among Republicans for a deal on his spending priorities. In addition to the meeting on Wednesday, Biden spoke Tuesday with a bipartisan group of governors, and on Thursday he will confer with several Senate Republicans.
That meeting comes after Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) proposed an infrastructure package that, while far smaller than Biden’s, was viewed by the White House as a serious effort to begin a discussion.
One of the major promises Biden built his campaign around was an ability to return Washington to a place that, despite disagreements, can find ways to compromise, and the White House very much wants a bipartisan achievement to boast of before the 2022 elections.
Biden is pushing for police reform and has backed legislation named for George Floyd, who was murdered by a Minneapolis police officer. A bipartisan group of lawmakers is trying to negotiate a policing bill that would muster enough Republican support in the Senate, although they have yet to strike a deal.
But much of the White House focus is on Biden’s proposed spending measures. Since his opening legislation, a $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, failed to attract any GOP votes in Congress, he has taken a more patient posture in trying to win bipartisan support for his next legislative items.
Biden is also considering reshaping his proposals into two pieces: one that could pass with bipartisan support, and another that would be pushed through Congress without Republicans.
“I want to know what can we agree on, and let’s see if we can get an agreement to kick-start this — and then fight over what’s left, and see if I can get it done without Republicans if need be,” Biden said Wednesday in an interview with MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki has said Biden’s only red lines at this point are doing nothing, and raising taxes on families making less than $400,000 a year.
During a briefing that occurred while Wednesday’s meeting was underway, Psaki expressed dismay that Republicans had ousted Cheney from House leadership for pushing back against Trump’s false claims about fraud in the 2020 election. She also cited Trump’s instigation of the lethal assault on the Capitol on Jan. 6 as Congress was certifying the election results.
“Our democracy was attacked,” Psaki said. “It’s disturbing to see any leader, regardless of party, being attacked for simply speaking the truth.”
Still, she said the episode would have little impact on Biden’s ability to work with McCarthy.
“The president is no stranger to working with people who he disagrees with or he has massive, fundamental disagreements with,” Psaki said. “What the president believes his role is, is to lead by example and to offer an alternative of leadership to the American people, which is reaching his hand across the aisle.”
Mike DeBonis contributed to this report.
