HONOLULU — President Barack Obama is cutting short his Hawaiian holiday to leave for Washington on Wednesday to address the unfinished “fiscal cliff” negotiations with Congress, the White House said on Tuesday.
As the clock ticks toward a Jan. 1 deadline, efforts to avert a sharp rise in taxes and deep spending cuts have stalled, worrying world financial markets.
Obama and congressional lawmakers left Washington on Friday for the Christmas holidays with talks to avert the fiscal disaster in limbo.
When Obama arrives back in Washington early on Thursday, the focus will shift to the U.S. Senate after Republicans in the House of Representatives failed to pass their own budget measures last week.
Obama is expected to turn to a trusted Democratic ally, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, to help craft a quick deal.
White House aides began discussing details of the year-end budget measure with Senate Democratic counterparts early this week, a senior administration official said on Monday
The president will also need at least tacit approval from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to insure Republicans will permit passage of what is likely to be a stripped down bill that prevents taxes from rising on all Americans.
The measure may not, however, contain difficult spending cuts both parties had sought to speed deficit reduction. It is unclear how the president will seek to address the draconian across-the-board government spending reductions set to go into effect early in the year without a deal.
McConnell, who is up for re-election in 2014, has been a cautious participant in the process. His spokesman has said it was now up to Democrats in the Senate to make the next move.
Once clear of the Senate, the fiscal cliff legislation must also win enough bipartisan support to pass the House of Representatives, which failed last week to approve Speaker John Boehner’s proposal to extend tax breaks for all Americans earning less than $1 million a year.
Conservative Republicans balked at any tax increases at all and withdrew support for the measure, which never came to a vote. Some Republican votes will be needed to pass any Senate bill.
BIG DAY THURSDAY
The next session of the Senate is set for Thursday, but the issues presented by the fiscal cliff — across-the-board tax increases and indiscriminate reductions in government spending — were not on the calendar.
The House has nothing on its schedule for the week, but members have been told they could be called back with 48 hours notice, making a Thursday return a theoretical possibility.
Obama and his family arrived in Hawaii early on Saturday and have devoted their time to spending the Christmas holiday together. First Lady Michelle Obama and the couple’s two daughters are to remain in Hawaii, suggesting the president hopes to rejoin them if a deal is struck
Before the talks ran into trouble, Obama had originally been expected to stay in Hawaii — where he was born — until well into the first week of January.
But many observers are pessimistic that lawmakers, who have repeatedly come close to agreement only to see negotiations collapse, can wrap up a deal in the few days left before the end-of-year cut-off point.
The impact of a blown deadline would likely be first seen in financial markets, which wobbled last week after House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner’s “Plan B” tax and spending effort fell flat.
Obama had offered a deal early last week that would have let tax rates rise for those making more than $400,000 a year, a higher threshold than the $250,000 income level he originally wanted to subject to higher tax rates. However, Boehner was unimpressed with the offer and pursued his alternative instead.
The president appears to have set consideration of fiscal cliff issues aside during his four days in Hawaii. His only public events have been to attend the funeral of long-time Hawaiian Senator Daniel Inouye on Sunday and a Christmas Day visit to soldiers at a Marine Corps base near the vacation home his family is using in Kailua, Hawaii.
He has spent his time with family and friends, with excursions to play golf, exercise, go hiking or to the beach.
(With additional reporting by Jade Eckhardt in Kailua, Hawaii; editing by Alistair Bell and Todd Eastham)
The cover story for the subpoena probably.
Looking to Harry Reid for help is a bad idea…..the liberals will try to spin this as a republican attack on the middle class, the elderly, and the poor. Heck why not? It worked in the election. Reid had a chance to fix all of these issues since 2006, what makes anyone believe he will be able to come up with a brilliant idea in the next 5 days.
Where are the rights “brilliant” ideas? Both sides are failing equally on this “fiscal cliff” scare-tactic and fear-mongering.
The right is screaming that we need to make cuts, but then they never specify which cuts we need to make.
The cuts on the right are easy to figure-the more someone will be hurt badly,the more likely that cut will happen.The Koches wouldn’t miss a few nickels from their billions but the R’s are making them and the Waltons richer than ever.
I’m hopeful the mental health dollars will be upped but I doubt they will.I worked in a mental health facility that on the day it closed was full and had a waiting list.
poor thing having to cut his vacation short..
Why didn’t they just spend Christmas at the White House to begin with. The money that is spent when the President goes on trips like this is unbelievable. All the money that is spent to decorate the White House and they decide Hawaii would better suit there taste.
And you were complaining when Bush took the most vacations of any president in history, while we were fighting two wars?
Not that I agree with the amount of days Bush spent on vacation, the logistics of his vacations were much less of a logistical problem as most of those vacations were spent at his ranch in Texas and created less challenges for the Secret Service as far as prescreening the area and overall security.
Bush has a home in Texas. Obama is from Hawaii. Gee, imagine….they like to go back to the state where they spent a lot of time.
Seems like after-the-fact allowances for the same behavior you were initially complaining about. Have some principles and don’t create little (and baseless) excuses as to why it’s okay for one, but not the other.
So the Secret Service has told you that its easier to protect Bush in TX than Obama in HI? Now you want to tell people where they should spend their vacation? I thought you folks wanted less government interference etc…or was that just so you could interfere without all the competition?
At least when GWB was on his frequent vacations he did less damage.
You DO realize that his vacations are on his own dime, there are plenty of congressmen that make more money than he does…and virtually every member of congress is/was on vacation as well.
I shudder to think of how well you’d do running one of the world’s superpowers.
Wrong. That man travels with dozes of secret service agents that have to be housed, Air Force 1, press, photographers, plus who knows what Biden is doing when the cats away. So he buys his own chicken sandwich, that’s nothing. But is that what they all do and what we allow, yes, so ho cares, not me. Our interest to china we accrue in one day is more then Obama can spend on a vacation during an 8 year term.
You have a very good point, I’ll concede that one certainly.
The fact remains, he’s allowed to go on vacation, just like every other person in every other branch of the government…but I know I know everyone loves to play armchair-president whenever our leader (regardless of who it is) farts and coughs.
Honestly I would NOT want someone to run a country for 4+ years without taking a vacation. He’s as human as everyone else, he needs to recharge like everyone else.
Disclaimer: I do realize that people who say “OMG TAXPAYER FUNDED VACATION” have NO idea that other people…on both sides of the aisle…are wasting taxpayer money in far more awful ways.
How many days has this Congress “worked?”A lot fewer than the President.
Totally agreed.
His vacations are his financial responsibility for his “personal expenses” but the logistics that are involved for security and moving equipment to his vacation destination is expensive (and we pay the bill for that) to say the least. You can shudder all you want to think of how I would do running a world superpower, I probably could not do any worse. I probably would have had more experience than he at the beginning of his first term.
AHAHAHA you need to up your Lithium. Thanks for the chuckle. :)
The solution would be a piece of cake if Boehner would allow a proposal to the floor that didn’t require entirely Republican votes to pass. Pelosi did this and the sky didn’t fall. Just put the President’s initial proposal to a vote and it would pass in the House with both Democrat and some Republican votes — why is it such a big deal? This Republican purity garbage is really harming our country.
the entire congress and the obama administration is complicit in perpetrating this fraud of a crisis on the american people.they engineered a disaster for the U.S. economy now they wait till the very last minute to come up with a solution. how many times in recent memory have they pulled the same stunt? this trick always serves as a way to slide in totally unrelated items for both sides while the masses sit by and wait to cheer when the “crisis” is averted.nothing new to see here folks,move along……….
“how many times in recent memory have they pulled the same stunt?”
I seem to remember things like this coming up often, starting as far back as I can remember (Reagan).
They keep doing it because people keep falling for it
Vacation? What’s that?
Dems control 2/3 of Washington DC. Congress (representatives) have passed numerous bills and Dems in the Senate haven’t even taking up a vote. The Senate needs to vote down the house bills before the house passes any new bills. We are going on five years without the US Senate passing a budget.
No one is buying that kind of spin.
I think the real thought process went more like this: “Let’s see, two more weeks getting nagged to death by Moochelle, or duking it out with Boehner? Ah, that’s a no brainer, DC here I come!”
I don’t agree with “Moochelle” but as one with Christmas guests(hide the good booze!),thanks for the laugh!There’s some truth there!
No offense meant to Mrs. Obama (we all have warts of some sort), just trying to get a laugh.
Gee! I was hoping he would stay there until (at least) Easter or better yet until New Years 2017!
This is all about him. He could have gone to Camp David and been right at “home” to deal with the fiscal crisis for which he is responsible. So, the 4 million dollar vacation is going to cost taxpayers even more, since the big plane will have to return for Michelle and entourage!
Air Force One is not on his own dime, as someone has remarked, and it is highly unlikely that the rental of the estate is either.