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Obama Keeps Eye on Iran and Health Law Amid Fiscal Standoff Obama Confident, but Wary of Economic Fallout
(about 2 hours later)
WASHINGTON — On what was shaping up as a Monday to remember at the White House, President Obama was alternately spectator and actor on three different issues that could define his legacy: the budget, health care and Middle East peace. WASHINGTON — President Obama expressed confidence on Monday that he was right to defy House Republicans’ demands as the hours ticked away toward a government shutdown. Yet offsetting the bravado at the White House was fear of what October’s unfolding events could mean for the economy.
With regard to the most pressing issue of the day, a midnight deadline for Congress to finance the domestic and military operations of the government as a new fiscal year begins on Tuesday, Mr. Obama has largely remained on the sidelines. He was in “wait-and-see mode,” as one aide put it, while Congress prepared for the latest go-round in the debate over government spending and Mr. Obama’s signature health care law. A day before uninsured Americans could begin signing up for coverage under the Affordable Care Act, the law that is the white-hot center of the political conflagration, Mr. Obama appeared self-assured but was nonetheless powerless to influence scores of uncompromising Republicans — many of them elected since he took office — who have bucked both their own party leaders and traditionally influential business groups. As he acknowledged, five years of work to prevent a second Depression and then spur a slow recovery was at risk of being undone, depending on how the month plays out.
But Mr. Obama sought to increase the pressure on House Republicans on Monday afternoon as he scolded them for making “extraneous and controversial” ideological demands in exchange for keeping the federal government open, and said the impact of a shutdown on Tuesday would be harmful to millions of Americans. Even if the immediate fiscal crisis was quickly averted, with a short-term deal to fund the domestic and military operations of government as a new fiscal year began Tuesday at 12:01 a.m., the fight will resume as the president and Congressional Republicans seek agreement for a full-year budget. The biggest, most economically threatening showdown still threatens: By Oct. 17, Congress must raise the nation’s debt limit to pay for bills already incurred or provoke a globe-shaking default.
“One faction of one party in one house of Congress in one branch of government doesn’t get to shut down the entire government,” Mr. Obama told reporters at the White House on Monday afternoon. “You don’t get to extract a ransom for doing your job.” So this is not a fight that Mr. Obama is relishing. Nor is it the one he expected when he ran for a second term, wrongly predicting last year that his re-election would break Republicans’ “fever” of opposition to him and his agenda, including the nearly four-year-old health care law.
The president’s comments came as House Republicans signaled that they would not yield on their demand that any stopgap budget measure be tied to a one-year delay in the Affordable Care Act, which was signed into law in 2010. The Senate’s Democratic majority, united behind the president, rejected that demand and voted overwhelmingly to strip Republican policy prescriptions from the spending measure and send it back to the House. Instead, House Republicans insist on defunding or at least delaying the 2010 health care law, just as its central provision is to take effect on Tuesday. They are convincingly vowing to oppose either a federal budget or an essential increase in the debt ceiling unless Mr. Obama agrees. The president just as persuasively refuses.
Even as the Affordable Care Act was at the center of the divisive budget debate, the White House juggled the last-minute details of putting a core piece of the law into effect on Tuesday. That is the long-anticipated start of open enrollment for the health insurance marketplaces, known as exchanges, that are intended to eventually make competitively priced health coverage available to the estimated 15 percent of uninsured Americans. “Here’s the bottom line,” Mr. Obama told reporters in the White House briefing room in the late afternoon. “I’m always willing to work with anyone of either party to make sure the Affordable Care Act works better, to make sure our government works better.”
In his comments to the news media, the president criticized opponents of the law for insisting that it be delayed or rolled back. He said that it will eventually provide affordable insurance to millions of people who have lived in fear of huge medical bills. Mr. Obama said that “time and time again” he had shown his willingness to compromise, “oftentimes to the consternation of my own party.”
He said that the insurance marketplaces where people can shop for new coverage will open for business on Tuesday regardless of what Congress does. And he bluntly told critics of the law that they will not win in their crusade to undo his signature achievement. “But one faction of one party, in one house of Congress, in one branch of government doesn’t get to shut down the entire government just to refight the results of an election,” Mr. Obama said. “Keeping the people’s government open is not a concession to meet.”
“An important part of the Affordable Care Act takes effect tomorrow,” Mr. Obama said. “That funding is already in place. You can’t shut it down.” Afterward, the president met with his cabinet to coordinate what a shutdown of government operations would entail and to ensure that “core essential functions continue.”
Against that double-barreled domestic backdrop, Mr. Obama was preoccupied with an event that on a normal day would be big news on its own: a rare White House visit from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel. The meeting came just three days after Mr. Obama broke a 34-year freeze in top-level contacts between the United States and Iran, Israel’s nemesis, via a phone conversation on Friday with President Hassan Rouhani. Even as the Affordable Care Act was at the center of the divisive budget debate, the White House juggled the last-minute practical and communications work of putting a core piece of the law into effect on Tuesday. That was the long-anticipated start of open enrollment for the health-insurance marketplaces — known as exchanges — that are intended to eventually make competitively priced coverage available to the estimated 15 percent of uninsured Americans.
It fell to Mr. Obama to reassure Mr. Netanyahu that such exchanges could perhaps lead to an agreement that Iran would stop its march toward a nuclear weapon and rejoin the international community, rather than buy Iran time to develop such weapons, as Israel fears. While the White House waited for the Republican-controlled House and the Democratic-led Senate to go through the final legislative motions to make their budget impasse official, Mr. Obama was preoccupied with an event that on a normal day would be big news on its own — a White House visit from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel. The meeting came just days after Mr. Obama broke a 34-year freeze in top-level contacts between the United States and Iran, Israel’s nemesis, by a phone conversation with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.
On Capitol Hill, Republicans made much of Mr. Obama’s willingness to talk to the Iranians but not to them, calling him “AWOL.” Neither Mr. Obama privately nor his advisers publicly evinced any concern that most Americans would blame the president for refusing to negotiate on demands that he defund or even delay the health insurance law. On Capitol Hill, Republicans made much of Mr. Obama’s willingness to talk to the Iranians, but not to them, and called him “AWOL” on the budget. But neither Mr. Obama nor his advisers showed concern that many Americans would agree with the Republicans and blame Mr. Obama for refusing to negotiate about demands that would undercut the 2010 health insurance law, his signature domestic achievement.
Yet, as administration officials acknowledged ruefully, the White House cannot revel in Republicans’ internal disarray and House leaders’ impotence against Tea Party Republicans. Mr. Obama, at least for now, was also looking impotent against the Republicans’ ideological militancy. So there were no negotiations, and the administration began preparations to shut down government, and to foist blame on Republicans.
Worse, the looming government shutdown only intensified fears in both parties — and financial markets, as the days’ stock losses indicated — that the hard-line conservatives would also force a more economically threatening showdown in mid-October. That is when Congress must raise the nation’s debt limit, allowing the government to pay its bills and creditors for obligations already committed to, or court a first-ever default. In the evening, Mr. Obama separately called the Republican and Democratic leaders of both the House and the Senate, but there were no indications of any ice-breaking.
In comments earlier in the day, Mr. Obama said he was not resigned to a government shutdown and indicated that he expected to speak with Congressional leaders in the coming days. He added that he would be “not only open, but eager to have negotiations around a long-term budget” once Congress passes a stopgap spending measure and raises the debt limit. Early in the day, as Mr. Obama sat alongside Mr. Netanyahu for a brief appearance before reporters and photographers, he alluded to the potential global ramifications of a shutdown and default.
“There’s not a world leader, if you took a poll, who would say that it would be responsible or consistent with America’s leadership in the world for us not to pay our bills,” Mr. Obama said during a joint appearance with Mr. Netanyahu. “We are the foundation of the world economy and the world financial system. And our currency is the reserve currency of the world. We don’t mess with that. And we certainly don’t allow domestic policy differences on issues that are unrelated to the budget to endanger not only our economy but the world economy.” “There’s not a world leader, if you took a poll, who would say that it would be responsible or consistent with America’s leadership in the world for us not to pay our bills,” the president said. “We are the foundation of the world economy and the world financial system.”
All day, against all evidence to the contrary, he expressed confidence “that in the 11th hour, once again, that Congress will choose to do the right thing and that the House of Representatives in particular will choose the right thing.”
But however the issue was resolved, it would most likely only buy time until the next crisis.