President Donald Trump hosted congressional leadership from both parties to discuss his agenda Monday, hitting topics including repealing and replacing Obamacare and his infrastructure plan.
The meeting — which included Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin, Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, House Speaker Paul Ryan, House Minority Leader and Vice President Mike Pence — took place just days ahead of the Republican policy conference in Philadelphia, where the party is expected to work out the details of their plans.
“Well, we talked about health-care reform,” Pence told reporters. “The president is committed to repeal and replace Obamacare simultaneously,” adding the plan would be coming “soon.”
Hoyer said the meeting was a casual gathering more than a “substantive discussion of the issues.”
“I and a number of other people brought up the ACA and our concern for it,” he told reporters. “Apparently the president, former President Obama indicated to the president, he said that if you come up with a better alternative, as exclusive, and as cost-effective that certainly we can talk about that and support something like that,” Hoyer told reporters.
McCarthy said he thought the meeting was a productive way for the president to build relationships on both sides of the aisle, adding they discussed “places that we could probably agree and places where we’ll disagree, infrastructure, places we can agree upon.”
“I thought the most import thing about it was the openness of President Trump and building a relationship, getting people together at the very beginning — the House, the Senate, the Republicans and Democrats and just having an open dialogue,” he said. “And he started the whole discussion with that he really felt from the American people’s point of view that for too long there have been politics and things weren’t getting done in Washington and he didn’t want that to happen.”
McCarthy said there was some banter among Republicans and Democrats over the confirmation process.
“We want government to get working, we don’t want to sit back,” he told reporters.
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