Democratic Centrists Lament Missed Opportunities to Keep the House
This post was originally published at Media Matters.
The House of Representatives has the power to change things in this country. This power is real. In the House of Representatives, Democrats have the majority. However, in 2013, President Barack Obama and his allies were able to take control of the House by a slim vote margin. The Democrats lost the House of Representatives by just two seats, after they could have won the majority. The result was devastating.
After the House elections, Democrats were in a better position to take control of the Senate and hold President Obama and the entire administration hostage, but it didn’t happen. This is a clear sign that President Obama is more powerful than anyone in Congress.
President Obama and the House of Representatives
The president is now in charge of the legislative process, but when they were in charge in the House, President Obama and his allies did not use the House to their advantage. Obama and his allies decided to ram through a bill from the Senate.
“There were opportunities to bring things to a head, to get a little cooperation on things that we both agree on,” Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D – Maryland, told Fox News at the time. “And we were unsuccessful on that.”
At the same time, there were opportunities to engage in negotiations between the President and Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio. However, these negotiations were also unsuccessful. The Democrats are on the defensive, and they failed to deliver on their side of the table.
“I think they were very aware of the power of the speaker, that the speaker could hold the entire government hostage on a particular issue, and that’s what he did,” Rep. Ted Deutch, D – Florida, told Fox News at the time. “The speaker can say that he’