President Barack Obama battled with Senate Republicans in a tense closed-door meeting Tuesday, facing tough criticism from his GOP adversaries — including John McCain — on issues ranging from health care to border security.
Senators and other sources inside the meeting described the gathering as “testy” and “direct” — and Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) accused Obama of acting two-faced by asking for GOP support on regulatory reform only to push forward with a bill supported mainly by Democrats. Others felt that the meeting may have made already tense relations between the two parties even worse.
"The more he talked, the more he got upset," Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) said. “He needs to take a valium before he comes in and talks to Republicans and just calm down, and don’t take anything so seriously. If you disagree with someone, it doesn’t mean you’re attacking their motives — and he takes it that way and tends then to lecture and then gets upset.”
The White House said that Obama made a plea for bipartisanship on some of the country’s most pressing issues — and he urged Republicans to stand up to their base and compromise with the Democratic Party.
Bill Burton, a White House spokesman who attended the meeting, later told reporters that the meeting was “civil in tone” and not as contentious as Republicans have made it out to be. But he said Obama directly challenged the GOP to work in a bipartisan fashion on immigration and energy – or risk seeing those two major issues fall apart this year.
Inside the lunch meeting, Obama squared off with his old rival McCain (R-Ariz.) over border security, sources said. Sources described Obama’s conversation with McCain as rather direct.
McCain said he told Obama: "We need to secure the borders first. He didn't agree." A McCain spokeswoman said their exchange was “frank but respectful.”
Shortly after the meeting, Obama called for 1,200 National Guard troops to be deployed to the border, and McCain quickly one-upped the president, asking for 6,000.
Obama also called for a comprehensive immigration plan, an idea McCain seemed to rebuff. And McCain also challenged Obama over constitutional concerns he's raised over Arizona’s controversial immigration law, saying administration officials needed to read the law first.
During the meeting, which lasted roughly an hour and 20 minutes, sources said Corker broached the issue of Wall Street reform, Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) spoke about the administration's response to the BP oil spill, Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) discussed health care reform and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) spoke on a variety of issues.
In one of the most heated exchanges of the lunch, Corker accused Obama of acting “duplicitous” in his calls for bipartisanship, saying that he was trying to cut a deal on regulatory reform only to see the rug pulled out from underneath him. At one point, Corker said Obama was using lunch with Republicans as a “prop.”
"I told him I thought there was a degree of audacity in him even showing up today after what had happened with financial regulation," Corker told reporters after Republicans met with Obama.