WASHINGTON — President Obama travels to the Capitol today to meet with House and Senate Republicans, the latest in a series of high-profile efforts to reach across the aisle and make good on his campaign promise to swim against the partisan tide that has flooded Washington for decades.
So far, his gestures have shown few signs of success, as Republicans have continued to snipe at his signature initiative -- legislation to stimulate the economy -- and even to question the sincerity of his efforts. In the stimulus bill's first two tests last week, it passed two committees without a single Republican vote.
But whether or not he picks up support from Republican lawmakers, Obama has already accomplished one important aim: He is winning over more Republican voters than he did on election day. If that continues, the president's hand could get stronger on Capitol Hill.
"You don't calculate the impact of his effort in terms of the number of votes he gets on the stimulus bill," said Bill McInturff, a GOP pollster who worked for Obama's campaign rival, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). "You calculate it based on how he is perceived by Republicans around the country, and it looks to be substantially more positive."
Still, it will be a blow to Obama if he ends up as Bill Clinton did in 1993, when the president's cornerstone economic initiative, which included a politically risky tax increase, passed without Republican support. If that happens to Obama, it could be a bad omen for his efforts to build bipartisan coalitions on even more divisive issues, such as healthcare and energy legislation.
"The stimulus bill is going to lay the predicate for future cooperation," said former Rep. Vin Weber (R-Minn.), who is now a lobbyist. "If this policy is dictated on a party-line vote, it's hard to imagine that anything else will be bipartisan."
For Republicans, the economic debate is the first test of how they will play the weak political hand they were dealt by the 2008 elections. They have proven willing to oppose Obama's stimulus plan so far, but some Republicans worry about the risk of confronting a popular president during an economic crisis, when their party's power is lower than it has been in more than a decade.
Obama's meeting on Capitol Hill today comes at the invitation of House and Senate Republicans, who said they were responding to his claim that he wants to hear their ideas. It will be the first time the new president has been to Capitol Hill since he was sworn in.
