The White House put the best positive spin on a staggering House Democratic rejection of the President Obama’s trade agenda Friday, by calling the resounding defeat of a trade assistance bill a “legislative procedural snafu” that can be overcome, and hailing a bipartisan majority on the “Fast Track” trade bill as a victory that over-performed expectations.
“I feel a little like Yogi Berra,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters after the surprisingly lopsided defeat on the trade adjustment assistance bill. “I’m tempted to say that it’s deja-vu all over again.”
RELATED: Dems deliver stinging defeat for Obama on trade
On May 12, Earnest said, he faced the press after Senate Democrats initially blocked Trade Promotion Authority for the president on a procedural motion but then the Senate came back and passed it later.
“We’re seeing a similar dynamic in the House right now,” Earnest said.
“To the surprise of a very few, another procedural snafu” happened today, Earnest said.
Earnest then made another big pitch for passing trade adjustment assistance next week when the House brings it up again for a re-vote.
“The president is the president of the U.S. today because of his commitment to fight for working class families,” Earnest said.
“If we’re going to walk the walk for those progressive values, then it’s critical to come together for TAA,” he said.
“Now we’re going to make the case to them that they should support a policy that they strongly supported in the past,” he said. “If they don’t they are going to see that priority lapse.”
When it comes to the broader trade promotion authority vote that passed with strong bipartisan support, Earnest said 28 Democrats ended up backing the measure.
“When you consider the results, it’s a strong endorsement of our strategy but clearly we have more work to do,” Earnest said, dismissing criticism from some Democrats, including Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas, that the president’s lobbying efforts on trade were too little too late.
The president traveled to Capitol Hill Friday morning to make a last minute pitch on the trade measures, urging fellow Democrats to “play it straight” and not sabotage the fast-track bill by killing the trade adjustment assistance measure. He also visited the congressional baseball game Thursday night in part to lobby undecided Democrats.
Minutes before the trade adjustment assistance vote, however, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., in a stinging rebuke of Obama’s message that morning, announced she would oppose the TAA bill, arguing that Democrats need to “slow down the fast-track bill.”
Earnest sought to downplay Pelosi’s differences on the issue after the vote.
“The president has enjoyed a very long, warm, productive relationship with Nancy Pelosi,” he said. “As the speaker of the House, she helped shepherd in once of the most substantial progressive agenda in history.”
“We prevented a second Great Depression, we reformed the health care system – the benefits of which are becoming clearer every day,” he said. He added that she also helped pass a repeal of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy in the military of gays and lesbians keeping their sexual identify private to avoid adverse actions against them.
