"White House Scrambles To Save Tax Cut Deal"

White House Scrambles To Save Tax Cut Deal
Brian Beutler | December 10, 2010, 9:30AM

The White House hoped to set its tax cut compromise on a glide path: announce a deal, pass it in the Senate, pass an identical version in the House, sign it, move on to the next big thing.

But yesterday, after House Democrats voted no confidence in the Obama plan, that's anything but certain. And with House Democrats vowing to tweak the package the Senate sends over next week, the White House is scrambling to make sure that doesn't happen.

"We are in the contact with the leaders in both houses and lots of individual members," said White House communications director Dan Pfeiffer on a conference call with reporters yesterday.

A broad canvas of House and Senate aides, both Democrats and Republicans, suggests that nobody -- not in the House leadership, not in the rank and file, not in the Senate -- has any idea what the consequences of this gambit will be.

Most sources expect that this is more bluster than power play -- that ultimately the legislation the White House wants will pass the House. But that doesn't square with the loud promises prominent Democrats are making to change the legislation. And though they don't come right out and say it, Republicans strongly suggest that they'll bolt if the agreement is tweaked dramatically.

Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (MD) has left Dem leadership enough breathing room to allow for the possibility that the House will pass the Senate's legislation word for word. "We may make some changes and send it back to the Senate," he said yesterday.

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