Susan Collins Hails ‘Excellent Meeting’ After Biden Hosts 10 GOP Senators in Oval Office, But Concedes They Didn’t Reach Deal on Covid Relief (UPDATED)

Reed RichardsonFeb 1st, 2021, 7:56 pm
 

Maine Senator Susan Collins (R) hailed the “excellent meeting” and “frank and very useful discussion” she and nine other GOP Senators had with President Joe Biden on Monday evening, but conceded that they did not make any concrete steps toward reconciling the large difference in the respective parties’ Covid relief packages.

Collins had called for the meeting with Biden and invited other moderate Republicans like Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Utah Sen. Mitt Romney. The meeting, originally scheduled for just an hour, ran far longer and lasted a little more than two.

“We outlined for the president the provisions that we have proposed as part of an approximately $600 billion package,” Collins said of the talks with Biden. “He explained in more depth areas that were not flushed out as much in the package, the $1.9 trillion package and it was a very good exchange of views. I wouldn’t say that we came together on a package tonight.”

“So I think it was an excellent meeting, and we’re very appreciative, as his first official meeting in the Oval Office, that the president chose to spend so much time with us in a frank and very useful discussion,” She added. “Finally, let me just say that we have demonstrated in the last year that we can come together on a bipartisan package dealing with the Covid crisis. In fact, we have done that not just once or twice, we’ve done it five times. And I am hopeful that can once again pass a sixth.”

Though Collins implied her meeting was just the first in an expected series of more bipartisan talks with the Biden administration — suggesting a lengthy negotiation process — Congressional Democrats signaled on Monday that they intend to act quickly to address the overlapping economic and public health crises facing the country. Both Speaker Nancy Pelosi and incoming Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer set the stage to use the budget reconciliation process to avoid any filibuster so they could pass Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan intact.

UPDATE, 8:40 p.m. 2/1/21: The Biden White House released a statement on Monday night that likewise called the bipartisan meeting as a “substantive but productive discussion,” but it reiterated that passing Biden’s full plan via reconciliation was still an option and that “he will not slow down work on this urgent crisis response.”

Watch the video above, via CNN.

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