Pelosi was sometimes left out of the loop in the past year, as Boehner and Obama worked on the details of a grand bargain. But as the fiscal cliff talks heat up in the lame-duck session, it seems the minority leader is in a position of power.
House Democrats “want to be at the table, and if they feel left out, they’ll sit on their hands,” the aide added.
Pelosi has not ruled out changes to entitlement programs, but she has drawn a line at benefit cuts. And she has questioned what Republicans really mean when they say they want “structural changes” to entitlements.
“I don’t know what they are saying by structural,” she said last week. “Is that a euphemism for I am going to cut your benefit if you are a middle-aged senior? Is that what structural change means? No, I don’t support that.”
Pelosi has also backed up Obama’s call for more growth-oriented stimulus in the short term.
In her time as minority leader and speaker, Pelosi built a reputation as a hard-nosed negotiator not afraid to fight those whom she sees as obstacles to her legislative priorities, whether that’s the Republican opposition or Obama. But that doggedness also caused Boehner and Senate leaders to see her as more of an annoyance than a negotiating partner in last year’s budget battles.
During the final weeks of last fall’s supercommittee negotiations — the failure of which led to the same $1.2 trillion in cuts at the center of talks now — Pelosi was left out of a meeting the other top three leaders held with the panel’s top members. Earlier that spring, she was largely kept out of government shutdown talks between Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., Boehner and Obama.
But the dynamics appear different this time.
“It makes all the sense in the world, from the perspective of the president, House Republicans and Senate Democrats, to have House Democrats at the table,” said one senior Senate Democratic leadership aide.
Republicans were hesitant to talk about the increased importance of House Democrats because doing so might reveal a lack of confidence in their own rank and file before negotiations have begun in earnest.
Though it appears unlikely Pelosi would be sidelined again, she may decide to delegate some of her negotiating power to other House Democrats, particularly House Budget ranking member Chris Van Hollen. The Maryland lawmaker served on the supercommittee as well as the deficit reduction working group led by Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.
“Absolutely — he’s the go-to guy on fiscal issues for Leader Pelosi,” said a senior House Democratic aide on whether Van Hollen will play a key role. “Obviously, the [White House] agrees with Pelosi by having [him] help with Biden’s debate prep.”
One wild card in Pelosi’s own conference could be her ability to maintain a united front.
For example, the centrist New Democrat Coalition has been posturing as would-be partners of Boehner in a deficit deal if they think Democratic leaders are leaning too far left.
At a press conference Nov. 15, New Democrats Vice Chairman Rep. Gerald E. Connolly, D-Va., said the members of the group were willing to discuss “anything,” including cuts to entitlement programs.
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