Cooper noticeably absent from summit

When Barack Obama first spoke to House Democrats as their party’s presidential nominee, he singled out only a few members of the caucus as being integral to his plans. One of those members was Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.).

In making his pitch that fiscal reform would not be just a campaign talking point but a major part of his presidency, Obama said in the private meeting that he was going to be soliciting help “from guys like Jim Cooper.”

“Cooper gets it,” Obama told House Democrats.

That was in July.

But on Monday, when President Obama finally held his long-awaited fiscal responsibility summit — kicking off the president’s plans to enact budget, procurement and even entitlement reforms — Cooper was not in the room.

No one doubts that Cooper still gets it — the budget hawk and longtime Blue Dog Democrat is still seen by his peers as one of the party’s most passionate and capable minds on a host of policy issues.

But Cooper did not receive an invitation to attend the summit, according to his office.

There was no clear explanation as to why a member who was singled out in front of his colleagues as a potential Obama right-hand man on budgetary reform issues was ultimately not invited to attend the president’s budget reform summit. The White House declined to comment.

While many of his colleagues rejected any notion that Cooper had been slighted, either by the White House or by congressional leaders with whom he has had a sometimes-strained relationship over the years, there was an acknowledgment that Cooper hasn’t exactly been the White House’s or the Democrats’ right-hand man in the talking-points department recently.

In early February, Cooper lit the airwaves ablaze after telling his home district-based “Liberadio” that he received “quiet encouragement” from the White House in response to his rejection of the House economic stimulus bill.

“Well, I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but I actually got some quiet encouragement from the Obama folks for what I’m doing,” Cooper said about his vote against the House’s $819 billion version of the bill.

“They know it’s a messy bill and they wanted a clean bill. Now, I got in terrible trouble with our leadership because they don’t care what’s in the bill, they just want it to pass and they want it to be unanimous,” Cooper continued. “They don’t mind the partisan fighting, ’cause that’s what they are used to. In fact, they’re really good at it. And they’re a little bit worried about what a post-partisan future might look like. If members actually had to read the bills and figure out whether they are any good or not. We’re just told how to vote. We’re treated like mushrooms most of the time.”

The next day Cooper released a statement saying that “at no point did any member of President Obama’s staff encourage me to vote against the House economic recovery bill,” and that he only “felt encouraged that the administration understood [his] concerns [with the bill] and shared my longstanding commitment to fiscal responsibility.”

Leading up to the high-profile gathering, a number of Democratic officials said they assumed it would be only logical for Cooper to be there if entitlement reform — which has become the Tennessee Democrat’s signature issue — was going to be discussed.

Leadership aides in the House suggested that the White House chose to keep the attendance list limited to congressional leadership and committee and subcommittee chairmen.

At the same time, a number of Cooper’s Blue Dog Coalition colleagues who are neither current Blue Dog leaders nor legislative committee or subcommittee chairmen — including Reps. Allen Boyd (D-Fla.) and Jim Matheson (D-Utah) — were in attendance.

And as the ample press coverage of the event showed, there were plenty of empty seats.

For many who know him well, the Tennessean’s initial remarks about his stimulus vote were vintage Jim Cooper.

And while it may not have been his remarks on the stimulus that led to any summit shunning, some Democrats speculated that for a White House intent on projecting an image of collegiality and refinement with regard to its plan to reform the federal budget process, a member with Cooper’s unbridled passion may not have been the best attendee.

Some of Cooper’s friends remember how that passion has gotten him in trouble before, including in 1994 when Cooper defied President Clinton in advocating for a healthcare reform bill drastically different from the plan being put together by then-first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton — an undertaking that cost Cooper a seat on the Energy and Commerce Committee and led the White House to set up a war room in opposition to him, which many believe contributed to his poor showing in his run for the Senate.

That past may have been remembered by the Obama White House, which also used the fiscal responsibility summit to reaffirm its commitment to enacting healthcare reform.

Others saw no slight whatsoever.

“Jim Cooper is one of the most brilliant minds when it comes not just to the budget but to healthcare,” said Rep. Lincoln Davis (D-Tenn.), who now occupies the seat Cooper held before his failed Senate run.

“I wouldn’t agree that he was slighted on this issue, because he has been listened to and continues to advise all of us on this side of the aisle.”