MICHELE NORRIS, host:
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Michele Norris.
No deal that's the message late today from President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner. The nation's top Democrat and Republican had been working largely behind closed doors on a sweeping plan to raise the debt ceiling and slash the deficit. Then came a last minute news conference from the White House.
President BARACK OBAMA: I just got a call about a half hour ago from Speaker Boehner, who indicated that he was going to be walking away from the negotiations that we've been engaged in.
NORRIS: The president appeared both surprised and frustrated.
President OBAMA: I've been left at the altar now a couple of times. And I think that, you know, one of the questions that the Republican party is going to have to ask themselves is, can they say yes to anything?
NORRIS: About an hour later, Speaker Boehner explained why he didn't think he could say yes to the deal they'd been hammering out and why he abandoned the talks.
Representative JOHN BOEHNER (Republican): Now, let me just say that the White House moved the goal post. There was an agreement on some additional revenues until yesterday when the president demanded $400 billion more, which was going to be nothing more than a tax increase on the American people.
NORRIS: For more on the impasse, we're joined now by NPR's Scott Horsley and NPR's David Welna. In a moment, we'll hear from you, David. But first, Scott, I want to know a little bit more about what happened at the president's briefing.
What more is the White House saying about this deal that was on the table, why it broke down, and why in the president's opinion the Republicans are not willing to say yes to anything?
SCOTT HORSLEY: Well, what they're saying is that the two sides were actually pretty close to a deal as of yesterday morning. The differences had been narrowed to three.
As you just heard Speaker Boehner say, the White House was pushing for more revenue. The GOP had agreed to accept something like $800 billion in additional tax revenue. That's a little bit more than you'd get from simply letting the high end Bush tax cuts expire. The Democrats wanted another 400 billion. But the White House says they were willing to come down on that figure if the Republicans would accept fewer spending cuts.
They were also divided about how deep the cuts in Medicaid should be. And there was a last minute effort by Republicans, according to the administration, to use the individual mandate in health care reform as a forcing mechanism. That is, if some of the desired savings didn't materialize, the mandate would go away. That was also a deal-breaker, as far as the White House was concerned.
NORRIS: Now, the president has called leaders back to the White House tomorrow at 11:00 AM because he wants them to explain what they plan to do. Is the White House putting its own plan also, or are they just going to listen to the leaders...
HORSLEY: Well, they've said there's no solution to the debt ceiling crisis without a legislative solution, so it is up to lawmakers. The administration says they're still open to a big deficit cutting deal. They think that's both best for the country and, frankly, perhaps easiest to pass in the House and Senate.
But at a minimum now, the president says, lawmakers must find a way to raise that debt ceiling before the August 2nd deadline and prevent a default. As Mr. Obama said bluntly tonight, we're running out of time.
NORRIS: Let's bring NPR's David Welna into this and get a little bit more on the Republican side of this story. David, Speaker Boehner gave two reasons for walking out of the talks. Remind us of what those two reasons were.
DAVID WELNA: Yes, he said that, first, that the White House insisted on raising taxes. And second, that he said they refused to get serious about cutting spending and, as he put it, making the tough choices that are facing our country on entitlement reform.
And, essentially, as Scott said, this was an argument about taxes. Speaker Boehner says that it was President Obama who walked away from his own agreement by suddenly asking for $400 billion more in tax revenues than had been agreed on - $800 billion had been as far as Republicans had been willing to go.
And Boehner said that the president on Thursday, moved that up to $1.2 trillion from 800 billion. And that was the deal-breaker. He said, you know, he and Majority Leader Eric Cantor, in the House, were unable to accept that. And he said the White House just was not serious enough about the spending cuts that they wanted.
Now, he was asked about the fact that the White House was offering more than $3 trillion in spending cuts over ten years much more than Republicans had asked for originally and how could he say that they weren't serious about this. But Boehner just insisted that this was not done in the right spirit. He said dealing with the White House was like dealing with a bowl of Jell-o. And as we heard in the quote from him, he said it was the president who moved the goal posts.
NORRIS: Just quickly, I'm curious about his dealings with members of his own party. We know he spent time with some of the members. Was that a factor here, he just couldn't sell it to his own party?
WELNA: That's right. He met with the members of his House Republican caucus this morning behind closed doors. After that, he came out and was very feisty at a news conference. This was about the time when he hadn't returned the president's phone call. And it was clear that he was not getting backing on this from his fellow Republicans.
NORRIS: That's NPR's David Welna. I spoke also with NPR's Scott Horsley. Thanks to both of you.
WELNA: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.