Biden to host top congressional leaders at White House in May

President Biden plans to host the top four congressional leaders at the White House on May 12.

The meeting, which was confirmed by White House officials and a spokesman for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), would be the first visit to Biden’s White House by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) will also attend.

The meeting, which was first reported by Bloomberg News on Wednesday afternoon, represents Biden’s latest effort to reach across the aisle amid high partisan tensions in Washington. Biden campaigned on being able to work with Republicans, but thus far he has not struck any deals with the opposing party.

“The President looks forward to building on that engagement by having a dialogue with Leader Schumer, Leader McConnell, Speaker Pelosi, and Leader McCarthy about policy areas of mutual agreement and identifying common ground on which they can work together and deliver results on the challenges facing American families,” the White House official said.

Ahead of Biden’s address to a joint session of Congress on Wednesday, McConnell sharply criticized the president in remarks on the Senate floor, accusing him of breaking his campaign pledge to unify the country.

“Over a few short months, the Biden administration seems to have given up on selling actual unity in favor of catnip for their liberal base covered with a hefty coat of false advertising,” McConnell said.

Biden has held other bipartisan meetings at the White House — none yet with Republican leaders — but collaboration with Republicans has thus far eluded him. Democrats used budget reconciliation to pass Biden’s massive $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief bill without GOP support.

McConnell, who has a history with Biden due to decades of time served together in the Senate, said in late March that he had barely spoken to the president since the Jan. 20 inauguration. McCarthy said as of early this month that he and Biden hadn’t spoken since the election.

The White House is in search of Republican support for Biden’s $2.3 trillion infrastructure proposal and has indicated it is open to compromise after a group of Republicans proposed a much smaller package earlier this month. The White House says that Biden and White House staff have hosted 130 members of Congress in total across his first 100 days in office, a marker of the administration’s frequent engagement with Capitol Hill.

Still, the prospect of Republicans and Democrats coming together on a major piece of legislation seems highly unlikely, and Democrats may ultimately try to move forward on a bill once again by using budget reconciliation.

On Wednesday evening, Biden will use his address to Congress to lay out his ambitious $1.8 trillion families plan, which includes funding for education and child care and tax credits for low- and middle-income families and is seen as a companion to his infrastructure proposal. Republicans have been critical of the content and price tag of Biden’s plans as well as his proposal that they be paid for with tax increases on on corporations and wealthy Americans.