House Majority Leader’s Quest to Soften G.O.P.’s Image Hits a Wall Within

WASHINGTON — Representative Eric Cantor of Virginia, the House majority leader, has been trying for months to remake the image of the Republican Party, from one of uncompromising conservatism to something kinder and gentler.

It isn’t working so well.

On Wednesday, Republican leaders abruptly shelved one of the centerpieces of Mr. Cantor’s “Making Life Work” agenda — a bill to extend insurance coverage to people with pre-existing medical conditions — in the face of a conservative revolt. Last month, legislation to streamline worker retraining programs barely squeaked through. In May, Republican leaders will try again with legislation, pitched as family-friendly, to allow employers to offer comp time or “flex time” instead of overtime. But it has little prospect for Senate passage.

So it has gone. Items that Mr. Cantor had hoped would change the Republican Party’s look, if not its priorities, have been ignored, have been greeted with yawns or have only worsened Republican divisions.

“We need to look at these issues through a more human lens and realize government has a role here, especially on some of these pocketbook issues,” said Representative Shelley Moore Capito, Republican of West Virginia, who expressed frustration with the lock-step opposition of the House’s fiercest conservatives. “Have we been successful? No. We’re still trying to find our way.”

The debacle on Wednesday was the worst moment yet. The Helping Sick Americans Now Act sounded like solid middle ground — a measure to actually expand the part of President Obama’s health care law that created a federal “high-risk pool” in which people with pre-existing conditions could band together to buy subsidized insurance coverage. The provision was to be paid for by siphoning money from another part of Mr. Obama’s health care law, the Prevention and Public Health Fund.

But these days, those who linger in the middle of the road end up flattened. The White House issued a stern veto threat to keep the money in the fund, which chased away Democratic votes from the Helping Sick Americans Now Act. The Club for Growth, a conservative political action committee, warned that Republicans who voted in favor of the act would have their scorecards marked down for supporting part of the health care law. L. Brent Bozell III, a conservative activist, labeled the bill “Cantorcare” — and not as a compliment.

“We often say we don’t need this Democrat big-government program, we need this Republican big-government program,” said Representative Trey Radel, Republican of Florida. “It’s time to say enough is enough.”

In the end, the votes were not there — not even close, House vote counters conceded.

“We absolutely intend to bring this legislation back up,” said Doug Heye, a spokesman for Mr. Cantor.

When Mr. Cantor delivered a “Making Life Work” speech at the American Enterprise Institute in February, his message to his party was urgent and well received. The party, he said, needs to get beyond its single-minded, green-eyeshaded message of fiscal austerity and look to the problems of ordinary struggling Americans. Education, work-force training, health care and medical research have to augment the central issue of fiscal discipline and balanced budgets, he said.

“It was meaningful and good advice to all of us,” said Representative Charlie Dent, a moderate Republican from Pennsylvania. “I wish more of our members would have heeded it.”

The decision to call off the vote on the health care bill on Wednesday — a rare occurrence in the House — set off a round of recriminations. Some Republicans complained that Mr. Cantor had not vetted his proposals before presenting them publicly as the party’s salvation, then forcing them to the House floor. Others said a large core of the House Republican conference had simply proved unwilling to move beyond the austerity message.

The Republicans’ embrace of such austerity was evident as the House Ways and Means Committee was drafting a bill on Wednesday to ensure that the federal government’s creditors would be the first paid with incoming tax revenues, should Congress refuse this summer to raise the government’s borrowing limit.

Jennifer Steinhauer contributed reporting.

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Shifting Dynamics Favor G.O.P. House Majority

But the 2012 struggle for control of the House is shaping up less as a partisan surge than as a series of squalls, in which the outcome will largely depend on individual survival skills rather than a national movement.

In New York, Dan Maffei, a Democrat, hopes to snag back a seat he lost two years ago, while Representative Kathy Hochul, a Democrat who won in a special election last year, is trying desperately to hang on. In California, a nonpartisan primary and an expensive member-against-member contest between two Democrats, Brad Sherman and Howard Berman, have muddled the outlook in a state where Democrats had high hopes.

In Illinois, Democrats are trying to unseat several Republicans, from the freshman Bobby Schilling to the long-serving Judy Biggert, thanks to a redistricting advantage. Republicans are countering with the same strategy in North Carolina, where moderate Democrats like Larry Kissell and Mike McIntyre face challenges.

The overall dynamic favors Republicans, who look poised to maintain their hold on the House. More Democrats than Republicans have retired in districts where they were endangered, and more Republicans benefited from the decennial redistricting, leaving the Democrats with too small a cushion of Teflon incumbents as they try to regain a majority in the House.

Of the 80 races viewed as most competitive by The New York Times, based on polls and interviews with independent analysts, 32 are leaning Republican, 23 are leaning Democratic and 25 are tossups.

Although lawmakers’ approval ratings have hit historical lows, it appears that many voters want their representatives to continue to take the fight to the opposing party.

“There is no doubt that voters believe Washington is broken,” said David Wasserman, the House editor of The Cook Political Report. “But most believe it is broken because the other side broke it.”

Referring to Speaker John A. Boehner, the top Republican, and Representative Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader, he added: “Voters in Boehner’s district believe they are sending Boehner there to fight Obama, and Pelosi’s district believes she is there to fight the Tea Party. It is a retrenchment, not a referendum.”

Unlike in 2006, when Democrats ran in unison against the Bush administration and dethroned the Republican majority, the Democrats now have no cohesive plan. Some will link themselves to President Obama; others will treat him and his policies like bedbugs.

At the same time, Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, does not appear to be creating the sort of political movement that Mr. Obama stirred in 2008, allowing Democrats to harness his momentum.

“In each of the past three election cycles,” Mr. Wasserman said, “things were all going right for one party. What we are seeing now is there is kind of a hybrid effect, with no real momentum for either party.”

The atmosphere is similar surrounding policy issues. Unlike the health care debate, which dominated the 2010 Congressional elections, with huge benefits for Republicans, no policy discussion appears to be dominating the House elections this year, beyond the universal desire for more jobs.

The upshot may well be a House with a few more Democrats or a few more Republicans but no radical reconstruction. More gridlock would be likely to follow.

“A lot had to go right for Nancy Pelosi to be speaker again, and a lot has gone wrong” for her to retrieve the gavel, said Paul Lindsay, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.

The Democrats, of course, will not retreat. With a message that focuses on House Republican votes, combined with the targeting of open seats and seats held by the most conservative members, Democratic officials believe it is possible to eke out the net gain of 25 seats needed to take back the House.

The party has “a gentle breeze behind our backs,” said Representative Steve Israel of New York, who leads the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

“Whether it is strong enough to take us to the majority remains to be seen, but election night will be a good night for Democrats,” Mr. Israel said.

The Democratic Party’s first step is to go after Tea Party-tinted incumbents in districts where they seem out of step with most voters. The Democrats have very good shots at defeating, for instance, Representative Joe Walsh of Illinois, who has derided his opponent, Tammy Duckworth, a disabled Iraq war veteran, over how often she talks about her military service, and Representative Ann Marie Buerkle of New York, who was blessed by Sarah Palin.

But Republicans have also outfoxed Democrats through redistricting and moving candidates around.

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