Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders will take a break from the campaign trail and is scheduled to meet with President Barack Obama at the White House Wednesday morning.
“The President and Senator Sanders first discussed this meeting last December when Senator Sanders attended the Congressional Holiday Ball,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters Tuesday. “The two will meet privately in the Oval Office and there will be no formal agenda.”
According to White House visitor logs, Sanders has visited the White House more than 40 times since Obama was first elected president, but the Vermont senator only met privately with him once, on Dec. 15, 2014.
Sanders’ visit to the White House comes as he is rising in the polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, and as tension and attacks between his campaign and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s increases.
Clinton has gone after Sanders for his 2005 vote for the Protection of Commerce Legal Arms Act, while Sanders has criticized Clinton’s previous positions on the Defense Of Marriage Act and the 1994 crime bill.
