Obama Plans to Meet With Key Lawmakers to Push Syria Plan
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration pushed forward on Monday for Congressional approval of its plan to carry out a punitive strike against the Syrian government.
The lobbying blitz was to continue in the afternoon, with President Obama set to meet at the White House with two key Republican lawmakers, Senator John McCain of Arizona and Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, who have pressed Mr. Obama to intervene more aggressively in Syria. Mr. McCain and Mr. Graham said over the weekend that they might vote against a resolution authorizing military action in Syria because they view the president’s plan as too limited.
But many more lawmakers in both parties were taking the oppositie approach of Mr. McCain and Mr. Graham, saying they were wary of a strike on Syria, no matter how limited.
The White House was moving aggressively to gain support among the president’s own party, with a 70-minute telephone briefing Monday morning to the House Democratic Caucus by Secretary of State John Kerry, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Susan E. Rice, the national security adviser, and James R. Clapper Jr., the director of national intelligence.
On Tuesday, Mr. Obama is to meet with the leadership of the Senate Armed Services Committee, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and their counterparts in the House.
Administration officials said the influential pro-Israel lobby group AIPAC was already at work pressing for military action against the government of President Bashar al-Assad, fearing that if Syria escapes American retribution for its use of chemical weapons, Iran might be emboldened in the future to attack Israel. In the House, the majority leader, Eric Cantor of Virginia, one of the few Jewish Republicans in Congress, has long worked to challenge Democrats’ traditional base among Jews.
One administration official, who, like others, declined to be identified discussing White House strategy, called AIPAC “the 800-pound gorilla in the room,” and said its allies in Congress had to be saying, “If the White House is not capable of enforcing this red line” against the catastrophic use of chemical weapons, “we’re in trouble.”
Another official, who acknowledged having deep doubts when the president disclosed on Friday night his desire for a Congressional vote — he said he first thought, “Whoa, why are we doing this?” — by Sunday had joined some other doubters in deciding the gambit was a good one, and would succeed.
“At the end of the day, we’re not going to lose the vote,” said a third official.
Given the risks, however, Mr. Obama’s White House team is wasting no time seeking lawmakers’ support. Although Congress is still in its summer recess, some administration officials traveled to Capitol Hill to meet with House members who might be available and wanted a briefing on Syria.
Briefers included Tony Blinken, the deputy national security adviser, who is a longtime aide to Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.; the deputy director of national intelligence, Robert Cardillo; the under secretary of defense for policy, Jim Miller; Wendy Sherman, the under secretary of state for policy, and Vice Adm. Kurt W. Tidd of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Mr. Obama and Mr. Biden, a senator for nearly four decades, will also be personally lobbying lawmakers. The White House plans to rely on supportive Republicans with intelligence backgrounds — like Representative Mike Rogers of Michigan and Senator Saxby Chambliss of Georgia — for an assist.
Although such tactics reflect an inside lobbying game, the White House will also pursue an outside game of trying to sway a skeptical American public — as appearances by Mr. Kerry on five morning talk shows reflected. In addition, Mr. Obama will use his trip this week to St. Petersburg, Russia, for the G-20 summit meeting of major industrialized and developing countries, to publicly and privately press the case.
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