Pull out of White House meeting

Pelosi, Schumer pull out of White House meeting after Trump tweet

By Carolyn Lochhead

Ahead of negotiations to prevent a government shutdown by the end of next week, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco and her Senate counterpart Chuck Schumer of New York abruptly canceled a White House meeting Tuesday with President Trump and Republican leaders after Trump tweeted that he expected no “deal” to come out of the meeting.

“Meeting with “Chuck and Nancy” today about keeping government open and working. Problem is they want illegal immigrants flooding into our Country unchecked, are weak on Crime and want to substantially RAISE Taxes. I don’t see a deal!” Trump said in a tweet Tuesday morning.

Pelosi and Schumer, who had hoped to use the meeting to discuss concerns about immigration and health care, issued a joint statement saying they saw no point in going to the White House. Instead they would limit their negotiations to congressional Republicans.

“Rather than going to the White House for a show meeting that won’t result in an agreement, we’ve asked (Senate Majority) Leader (Mitch) McConnell and (House) Speaker (Paul) Ryan to meet this afternoon,” the pair said. “We don’t have any time to waste in addressing the issues that confront us, so we’re going to continue to negotiate with Republican leaders who may be interested in reaching a bipartisan agreement.”

Republicans will need Democratic votes to keep the government from shutting down Dec. 8. Democrats are trying to use their leverage to extend legal protections for the 800,000 so-called Dreamers, immigrant children brought without papers to the United States as children.

In September, Trump cut a deal with Pelosi and Schumer on raising the debt ceiling that left Republicans out in the cold and gave Democrats the upper hand.

On Tuesday, Ryan and McConnell shot back with their own joint statement blaming Pelosi and Schumer for endangering soldiers on the battlefield.

“We have important work to do, and Democratic leaders have continually found new excuses not to meet with the administration to discuss these issues,” Ryan and McConnell said. “Democrats are putting government operations, particularly resources for our men and women on the battlefield, at great risk by pulling these antics. There is a meeting at the White House this afternoon, and if Democrats want to reach an agreement, they will be there.”

Congress faces multiple critical deadlines over the next two weeks, to fund the government, pay for multiple climate-related disasters including the Wine Country fires, and reauthorization of a giant health insurance program for children, among other things.