Eric Cantor rises fast as leader but risks overplaying hand

As he has surged to the forefront of debt-limit negotiations and faced round-the-clock scrutiny on cable and radio talk shows, a fundamental question about House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s high-stakes political maneuvering is being discussed in the halls of power.

Is he building street cred with House Republicans or overplaying his hand?

The answer may be both. Cantor’s allies note that he’s been put in the spotlight by assignment — from Speaker John Boehner and President Barack Obama — not by choice. And they say he has gained political capital within the GOP conference.

Cantor has a lot riding on the outcome of the debt-limit negotiations. He’ll share in the public blame if they fall apart and the economy tanks, and he’ll face recriminations from his conservative base in the House if he cuts too soft a deal with the president.

Still, there’s little question that Republicans, led by Cantor’s steadfast loyalty to their bottom line, have forced the debt-limit debate to be framed in terms of trillions in cuts instead of the clean debt increase Obama originally wanted.

With only 22 percent of respondents supporting a vote in favor of the debt increase according to a Gallup Poll, Republicans believe they’re on firm footing with voters as they push for historically deep spending cuts.

“He’s trying to negotiate the best possible position for members that can pass the House,” Cantor spokeswoman Laena Fallon told POLITICO.

He won applause from some corners of the Republican universe when he blew up Vice President Joe Biden’s deficit-reduction talks because Democrats wanted to negotiate increasing taxes. And while he’s been the target of scorn from liberal television hosts, op-ed writers and folks in his own party who don’t like what he’s saying, Cantor’s repetition of the no-taxes hard line simply echoes the firmly held beliefs of his colleagues.

“He’s telling them what they want to hear,” said one Republican who is critical of Cantor. “I suppose it helps him,” the frustrated lawmaker said, but “he’s all about Eric.”

That’s the kind of caricature Democrats are hoping to draw in an effort to gain leverage in the debt-limit talks. In particular, they’ve been working to hammer an existing wedge deeper into the relationship between Cantor and Boehner. When Cantor complained at a White House meeting Tuesday that Democrats had leaked his presentation from the previous day while the president had not shared his ideas on paper, Obama replied that he assumed talking to Boehner — which he had done — meant talking to the entire Republican Conference.

For years, Democrats from Obama on down have sought to make Cantor a whipping boy, as they think his persona is too smug for mainstream America. The Senate’s Democratic Policy and Communications Committee pulled this quotation from Cantor’s high school yearbook to portray him as unreasonable: “I want what I want when I want it."