The GOP may have gained control of Congress following the mid-term elections, but President Obama is making it clear that he’s still running the show and won’t hesitate to use his veto pen to control the outlandish counter-legislation that will surely come once the new Congress is sworn in next month.
The new Congress hasn’t yet been sworn in, but President Obama already is warning he plans to use his veto pen to counter initiatives from the incoming Republican majority.
Obama, despite his near-constant friction with congressional Republicans the last few years, rarely has used the presidential veto — in part because legislation he didn’t like typically died in the Democrat-controlled Senate before reaching his desk.
But with Republicans taking charge of the Senate next month and building their majority in the House, Obama said in an NPR interview he’s dusting off the veto pen.
“There are going to be some areas where we disagree and, you know, I haven’t used the veto pen very often since I’ve been in office,” Obama said. “Now I suspect there are going to be some times where I’ve got to pull that pen out.”
The agenda for the incoming Republican majority indeed could set up a series of veto stand-offs.
In the interview with NPR, the president suggested he would mostly use his veto pen to block efforts to unravel existing laws and regulations pushed by his administration.
“I’m going to defend gains that we’ve made in health care; I’m going to defend gains that we’ve made on environment and clean air and clean water,” he said.
At the same time, he said, “what I’m hopeful about — and we saw this so far at least in the lame duck — is a recognition by both Speaker Boehner and Mitch McConnell that people are looking to them to get things done and that the fact that we disagree on one thing shouldn’t prohibit us from getting progress on the areas where there’s some overlap.”
It’s good to know that the POTUS is ready to flex his Presidential power because the petty party aka the GOP are surely going to make his last 2 years in office hell.
