US President Barack Obama is gearing up for a tougher second half of his term in the White House as a new Congress was being sworn in Wednesday with Republicans back in control of the House of Representatives. The new Republican majority in the House has vowed to derail as much as it can of Obama’s domestic agenda, pledging a vote within a weak to repeal last year’s massive overhaul of the health care system, and promising deep cuts in what they consider out-of-control government spending.
“The people voted to end business as usual, and today we begin carrying out their instructions,” Republican John Boehner will say after being sworn in later Wednesday as the new speaker of the House, according to prepared remarks released by his office.Yet Republicans will have little chance of getting their most ambitious pieces of legislation through Congress, including the health care repeal, as left-leaning Democrats still hold the majority in the upper Senate chamber and Obama wields a veto over all lawmakers’ decisions.
The House and Senate were both called to order at noon (1700 GMT), with re-elected and incoming lawmakers being ceremonially sworn into their offices. Vice President Joe Biden was presiding over the proceedings in the Senate.
Boehner was to later take the speaker’s gavel from Nancy Pelosi, who will be relegated to leader of the minority Democrats. Her party is gearing up for a full-throated defence of their own agenda of the past two years in anticipation of Republican attacks.
Obama has called on both sides to put aside their differences and avoid an early start to the 2012 presidential elections, urging Republicans to work with him to restore a still fragile economy and lower an unemployment rate that remains near 10 percent.
“Obviously, we’ve got a lot of work to do,” Obama said in an interview Wednesday with The New York Times. “The American people are expecting us to hit the ground running and start working with this new Congress to promote job growth and keep the recovery going.”
Boehner will also note the uncertain economic times in his afternoon speech, but will focus on Republican priorities of slimming the size of government in order to get the world’s largest economy moving again.
“Our spending has caught up with us, and our debt will soon eclipse the size of our entire economy,” Boehner will say, picking up the key campaign theme that swept Republicans back into power in November’s congressional elections.
But Boehner also suggested an awareness of just how fleeting the renewed support for his party could be, amid deep disaffection from the public with the way Congress does business. It was only four years ago that Democrats were swept into control of Congress in the final years of president George W Bush’s term.
“The American people have humbled us,” Boehner will say. “They have reminded us that everything here is on loan from them.”
Among the first acts of Republicans will be to slim office budgets in the House by about 35 million dollars, a drop in the bucket of the country’s $1.3-trillion deficit in 2010, but hailed by Boehner as a sign that his party is serious about cutting costs.
Republicans will also soon unveil more ambitious plans to cut $100 billion in domestic spending. The Obama administration has warned conservatives against proposing cuts especially to education and innovation.
