President Obama will not negotiate with Republicans to avoid shutting down the federal government at midnight, a White House spokesman said on Wednesday.
“The president is not the leader of the House of Representatives and the president is certainly not the leader of the Senate either,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said, explaining why Obama doesn’t support “circumventing” House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid by negotiating directly with House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell alone.
“It would be foolish to leave Democrats in Congress out of negotiations,” Earnest said, adding that the Obama administration hopes that Congress will pass a “clean” measure to temporarily fund the government.
“While the administration will certainly be involved in these budget discussions, Leader Reid and Leader Pelosi and their support is gonna be necessary to get this done,” Earnest said.
It’s Congress’ “basic constitutional responsibility” to pass a budget, he added. And the last time a longer-term budget agreement was reached, two years ago, it was brokered by Ways and Means Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., then the House Budget Committee chairman, and then-Senate Budget Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray, D-Wash.
“It’s not an agreement that anyone thought was perfect,” but it was a good compromise, “which is why it’s been two years since we last had this standoff,” Earnest said.
