President Barack Obama will cap a two-day period of intense outreach to Congress, meeting with the Senate Republican Conference late Friday morning on day 11 of the government shutdown and less than a week before a potential default.
The gathering with more than 40 GOP senators is the culmination of talks between the White House and each major Capitol Hill faction on how to reopen government and evade a debt crisis. On Thursday afternoon Obama met with House Republican leaders and committee chairmen who want to raise the debt ceiling for six weeks and then open the government. During that meeting, the president asked the House GOP “what’s it going to take to” open up the government.
Obama’s meeting with House Republicans ended without agreement on a deal. But for the first time, senior aides, lawmakers — and even staunch conservatives — feel an agreement is possible.
House Republicans and the White House worked through the evening to craft an accord to lift the debt ceiling and jump-start fiscal talks. The House Republicans sent a proposal to Obama at 10 last night and as of Friday morning they were waiting for a response.
At issue is putting in place a framework for six weeks of budget talks. If Obama and House Republicans could find common ground on what those talks would look like and what they would achieve, it would increase the likelihood of an expedient lifting of the debt ceiling and re-opening government.
Right now, House Republicans want to fund the government through Dec. 15, and lift the debt ceiling through Nov. 22. That would open two tracks for negotiations. Appropriations negotiators would develop 2014 funding levels. And then broader fiscal talks – spearheaded by Budget Chairman Paul Ryan, Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp and GOP leadership – would proceed alongside the debt ceiling timeline.
In the meantime, Obama will meet Friday morning with GOP senators who have been sketching out their own rough framework for lifting the debt ceiling and reopening the government. The president has long been trying to woo Republican senators, holding open-ended budget talks throughout the year, though those discussions were broken off in August over a lack of progress.
The open-ended talks by a group of Senate Republicans and several influential Democrats are based off the work of Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and have been encouraged by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). But several of the ideas would affect portions of Obamacare, like repealing the medical device tax, verifying income for Obamacare subsides and changing the Independent Payment Advisory Board. Though those ideas do not attack the heart of the health care law like past efforts of House Republicans, they still may turn off the president and Senate Democrats who have emphasized Obamacare will not be part of debt ceiling and government funding talks.
Obama will also come face to face on Friday with conservative senators like Ted Cruz of Texas, who led the charge for the Republicans to try to defund Obamacare as part of a spending bill.
Senate Democrats are still heading toward a Saturday vote on a clean raise to the debt ceiling into 2015, which needs the support of six Republicans to advance and is widely expected to fail.
Optimism grows ahead of Obama"s next Hill meeting
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