House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) said bringing up something like the DREAM Act would be "worthy of consideration" a day after his No. 2, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), embraced the plan that would give children brought to the United States illegally a pathway to citizenship.

The idea is "worthy of consideration," Boehner said Wednesday at his weekly press conference. As speaker, he said, he wants to "do everything I can to foster this continuing conversation" regarding immigration.

Yesterday during a speech that aides described as "Republican re-branding," Cantor expressed support for ideas found in the DREAM Act that were voted down by Congress in 2010 saying.

"It is time to provide an opportunity for legal residence and citizenship for those who were brought to this country as children and who know no other home," Cantor said.

Boehner did not wholly embrace the DREAM Act, however, which is understandable considering the speaker has to weigh politics within his conference.

Eric Cantor seems to have moved more to the middle on immigration, according to prepared remarks the House majority leader will deliver Tuesday at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington conservative think tank.

Cantor has always been in favor of giving visas to highly skilled immigrants educated in America, but today he takes it a step further, calling for legal residence and citizenship for children brought here illegally by their parents and a guest-worker program.

Cantor also says to stop making immigration a wedge issue. 

"While we are a nation that allows anyone to start anew, we are also a nation of laws, and that's what makes tackling the issue of immigration reform so difficult," Cantor will say, according to prepared remarks. "In looking to solve this problem soon, we must balance respect for the rule of law and respect for those waiting to enter this country legally, with care for the people and families, most of whom just want to make a better life, and contribute to America. 

"A good place to start is with the kids. One of the great founding principles of our country was that children would not be punished for the mistakes of their parents. It is time to provide an opportunity for legal residence and citizenship for those who were brought to this country as children and who know no other home. I'm pleased that many of my colleagues in both chambers of Congress on both sides of the aisle have begun work in good faith to address these issues. And I'm pleased these discussions make border security, employment verification and creating a workable guest worker program an immediate priority. It's the right thing to do for our families, for our security, and for our economy. 

"There are some who would rather avoid fixing the problem in order to save this as a political issue. I reject this notion and call on the President to help lead us towards a bipartisan solution rather than encourage the common political divisions of the past."

Cantor does not provide any specifics in his speech and was never too enamored with the DREAM Act, which would provide a pathway to citizenship for children brought to the U.S. illegally back in 2010.

However, his position today seems to indicate that the man, who controls the legislation that makes it to the House floor, is open to making illegal-immigrant minors full citizens. The key will be for what price.

This is also significant because House Speaker John Boehner declined today to explicitly back a pathway to citizenship similar to what Marco Rubio proposed last week.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) said  negotiations between the White House and Republicans are at a "stalemate" after a proposal by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and White House Director of Legislative Affairs Rob Nabors was soundly rejected by Republicans yesterday.

“There's a stalemate, let's not kid ourselves,” Boehner said Friday at a news conference following President Obama’s event in Pennsylvania.

Boehner contended that the White House's proposal was "not a serious proposal," and that he's disappointed that three weeks after he gave a speech saying Republicans would be willing to budge on revenues – but not tax rates as the president has called for -- that this is what was offered to them.   

“When I come out the day after the election and make it clear that Republicans will put revenue on the table, I took a great risk,” Boehner claimed, adding of the White House plan, “It's not a serious proposal and so right now we're almost nowhere.”

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor echoed those comments, deriding the White House proposal as “not a serious offer.” He added, however, that they "remain in discussions" to find a solution to avert the fiscal cliff.

“All of a sudden,” Cantor said, “they're asking for $1.6 trillion in tax hikes and nowhere near that number in spending reforms.”

But Cantor would not say if Republicans would make a counter-offer to the White House, only saying that "this is a serious matter," and "we're not interested in playing rope-a-dope."

“What we will do is continue to take this as a serious matter,” Cantor said. “This is not a game. We're not interested in playing rope-a-dope. We're interested in trying to solve the problems of the American people so that you don't see taxes go up on anybody, so that we can engage in tax reform and get this economy going again. We're not playing a game. We're being serious. That offer yesterday was simply not serious.”

President Obama wants Republicans to go along with raising rates on the top 2 percent of Americans. Republican leadership has so far refused to entertain that.

“We take the position that raising tax rates is absolutely not something that helps get people back to work,” Cantor said, adding, “We don't want to increase tax rates; we're not going to increase tax rates, and we want to do something about the spending problem.”

Entitlements are also a sticking point. The White House has accused Republicans of not being specific about what entitlement cuts they would like to see.  Asked if the GOP would go back to the White House with which cuts they want, Cantor demurred.

The gulf between Republicans and Democrats on the “fiscal cliff” grew larger today as the GOP dismissed the White House’s opening offer as “unbalanced” and “unreasonable.”

Late this afternoon, details of the President Obama’s first proposal in dealing with the fiscal cliff were leaked by GOP aides upset that Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner presented an offer they believed was one-sided and illogical.

Geithner’s offer included a $1.6 trillion tax increase, an extension of the payroll tax cut and unemployment insurance, as well as a request for $50 billion dollars in new stimulus spending for fiscal year 2013.

“We’ve offered a ‘balanced’ approach to deal with the fiscal cliff: raising revenue in a way that protects jobs while cutting spending,” a congressional Republican, familiar with the talks, contended. “But, after two weeks of discussions, the offer the White House made today is completely unbalanced and unreasonable, and amounts to little more than reiterating the president’s budget request – which failed to get a single vote in the House or Senate.”

The aide then laid out the GOP’s problem with the proposal: 

1)            Earlier this year, the Senate passed a tax bill with 51 votes, after a full-bore lobbying campaign by the White House.  That bill – which the White House has constantly been calling on Congress to pass – would raise approximately $800 billion in additional tax revenue.  The White House offer today called for nearly twice that amount of tax revenue, including plenty of rate hikes.  While $1.6 trillion is the White House’s public position, it is ridiculous to offer that amount two weeks after negotiations began - and less than a month before we must have a solution.  Why on Earth would the White House think the Senate would or could pass a bill with DOUBLE that amount in tax hikes? (let alone the House?)

2)            The White House keeps saying it wants a ‘balanced approach’ but this offer is completely unbalanced and unrealistic.  It calls for $1.6 trillion in tax hikes – all of that upfront – in exchange for only $400 billion in spending cuts that come later.  Plus, the only entitlement changes they proposed come from the exact proposals in the President’s budget. 

3)            They also want a permanent, unlimited debt limit increase – for free.  No additional cuts or reforms.  Not to mention a host of other, unrelated White House proposals – including even more ‘stimulus’ spending.

The conservative publication The Weekly Standard reported that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) “burst into laughter” when Geithner offered the plan, because it was so “one-sided and vague on spending cuts.”

The flat-out rejection could mark a significant turning point in the negotiations between the White House and congressional Republicans. No longer is there post-election optimism for a large, bipartisan deal.

“With this opening offer, we’ve essentially wasted three weeks," another GOP aide told NBC News.

Significant breakdowns were part of the 2011 “Grand Bargain” debt talks in the summer of 2011, but they did not occur this early in the process.

This could also, however, be just the opening salvo in what will be long, intensive negotiations. It signals that the White House is not about to start negotiations with major concessions after winning reelection, something the president has previously been criticized for from the left.

From the beginning of the "fiscal cliff" negotiations, aides from both sides have said that November would be for saber rattling and December would be when a deal is put together between President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner with Majority Leader Harry Reid’s blessing.

Well, consider comments from Boehner and Reid today to be the November saber rattling reporters were warned about.

In his weekly press conference Boehner called out Obama and the Democrats.

"The president has warned us about the dangers of going over the fiscal cliff, but his actions have not matched his public statements,” said Boehner, who acknowledged speaking with the president Wednesday night and called it “very nice” but “direct.” “Members of his own party seem quite comfortable sending the economy over the fiscal cliff."

Boehner said that no “substantive process had been made over the last two weeks” and that he was “disappointed” with the current state of the fiscal cliff negotiations. He also chided Democrats for not offering, he says, serious spending cuts in exchange for his promise of some increased revenue.

Speaking later in the day, Reid took this blunt shot at Boehner: “I don’t understand his brain.”

Reid called for Republicans to make “a serious offer” and indicated that Democrats would not act until they heard Republican demands on cuts to entitlements.

Along with raising tax rates, entitlements are also a major sticking point in the negotiations. Neither side wants to be the first to put their fingerprints on any specific entitlement cuts due to the risk of a major public backlash from seniors.

Asked by NBC News what specific cuts to entitlements the GOP would like to see, Boehner pointed to previous budgets passed by the House GOP and rejected by Democrats, but he declined to be precise in what he wanted out of these negotiations.

J. Scott Applewhite / AP

House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio gestures as he speaks to reporters on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Nov. 29, 2012, after private talks with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on the fiscal cliff negotiations.

“It's been very clear over the last year and half,” Boehner contended. “I've spoken to the president about many of them. If you look at our budget, where we outline very specific proposals that we passed in last year's budget and the budget before, we know what the menu is; we don't know what the White House is willing to do to get serious about our debt crisis."

Boehner dismissed an assertion that the talks had broken down, but his tone was far from optimistic. Wall Street is hoping to see a deal reached, is paying close attention, and both sides are acutely aware of that.

In what could be another potential headache for the White House, Boehner did not back down on his 2011 position regarding raising the nation’s debt limit, saying, “Any increase in the debt limit must be accompanied by spending cuts."

White House Spokesman Jay Carney said he was “surprised” by Boehner’s debt limit comments.

Buoyed by national editorials condemning some Democrats’ desire not to touch entitlements in any fiscal cliff negotiations, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) challenged the White House today on the issue of entitlement reform.

Citing White House adviser David Plouffe recent comments that “fiscal cliff” talks should address Medicare and Medicaid, the “chief drivers of our deficit,” Cantor said, “we have seen, this morning, several editorial writers indicate the same; that it is important that we put these drivers of the deficit on the table and include them as part of any agreement to avoid the fiscal cliff.”

Cantor defended the GOP’s position of no increase on taxes for the wealthiest Americans and claimed that the party has “done its part” by putting new revenue on the table in the form of minimizing tax deductions and closing loopholes. He then accused the Obama administration of not putting forward a “good-faith effort…to talk about the real problem that we're trying to fix.”

Cantor’s desire to shed light on what he sees as Democrats’ intransigence on entitlement reform is a calculated effort by the GOP to try and paint the president and his allies as stubbornly in favor of policies that will add to the deficit, GOP aides told NBC News.

Recently, Democrats have coalesced around the idea that a “fiscal cliff” agreement should not necessarily touch Social Security and likely even Medicare or Medicaid -- and only pertain to spending cuts and taxes. 

“If the public sees we’re willing to give something and Democrats are not, it’ll strengthen our negotiating position,” one GOP aide admitted.

It remains to be seen whether the American public will buy such an argument, especially with polls showing a majority supporting the idea of raising taxes on the wealthy to pay down the debt and not raise even the entry age into Medicare.

Michael Conroy / AP

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor of Va.

Republicans, however, are banking on saying that Democrats are just as, if not more, unyielding on their “sacred cows,” and that leading to the typical Washington narrative of both parties being unwilling to move toward the center in favor of their own special interests. That, Republicans believe, could ultimately hurt the president, elected on the promise of doing big things. 

Anyone thinking Republicans might be ready to accept extending the Bush tax cuts for those making less than $250,000 now, think again.

House Speaker John Boehner (R), the man at the center of negotiations with President Obama, today rejected Oklahoma Rep. Tom Cole’s suggestion to pass an extension of tax cuts for 98 percent of people, declare victory, and go home.

Yuri Gripas / Reuters

U.S. House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) speaks next to Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, November 28, 2012.

"I told Tom earlier at our conference meeting that I disagreed with him,” Boehner said at a Capitol Hill news conference Wednesday morning. “He's a wonderful friend of mine and a great supporter of mine. In my view, raising taxes on the so-called top 2 percent, half of those taxpayers are small-business owners that pay their taxes through their personal income filing every year. The goal here is to grow the economy and control spending; you're not going to grow the economy if you raise the top 2 percent rates. It'll hurt small businesses, and it'll hurt our economy, why this is not the right approach. We're willing to put revenue on the table as long as we are not raising rates."

Cole (R-OK) on Wednesday reiterated his call for Congress to pass an extension of the Bush tax rates for those making less than $250,000 first and then work on the extension for higher-earners later, a major break from the Republican's strategy in fiscal-cliff negotiations.

“In my view, we all agree that we're not going to raise taxes on people who make less than $250,000 dollars, so we should just take them out of this discussion right now,” Cole said after a meeting of the GOP Conference. “Continue to fight against any rate increases; continue to try to work, honestly, for a much bigger deal.”

Cole, the deputy whip and former National Republican Congressional Committee chairman, first made the suggestion during a closed-door "whip meeting" yesterday, which was first reported by Politico last night.  His comments have drawn criticism from those in his party.

Boehner is not the only Republican to disagree with Cole. Rep. Sean Duffy said on MSNBC’s Daily Rundown Wednesday morning that he believed Cole’s views are in the “minority” of House Republicans. In fact, interviews with other GOP members confirms that.

The lack of support for Cole’s proposal highlights the gap that persists between the White House and House Republicans with the clock ticking toward the so-called “fiscal cliff,” when all Americans would see tax increases and there would be a round a severe Defense and domestic spending cuts unless a deal is struck.

“Cherry picking provisions and rates right now doesn’t solve the problem, and they're not a serious deficit solution,” Rep. Kevin Brady (R-TX) told reporters today after a meeting of the Republican Conference. 

Brady, who sits on the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, said he is advocating for comprehensive tax reform, to be completed next year after all rates would be extended. 

“I think we're strongly unified behind no tax increases on New Year’s Day,” he said.

Rep. Raul Labrador (R-ID) echoed Brady’s concerns, saying he believes the majority of the Republican Conference, including himself, is opposed to the idea of decoupling the Bush tax rates.

“We have to make tough decisions about our tax rates,” Labrador said. “We have to make tough decisions about our spending; we have to make tough decisions about our deficit. Let's do that today. There's nothing courageous about saying let's raise taxes on a few people today.”

In August, House Democrats proposed a bill that would do exactly what Cole proposed, but it failed 257-170 with no Republicans voting for the bill, and 19 Democrats voting against it.

Related: 

How much is $250,000? Depends on the location

In the early talks to avert the so-called "fiscal cliff," congressional Republicans are taking a page straight out of the summer 2011 playbook -- going back to the negotiations during the showdown over the debt ceiling.

That July, House Speaker John Boehner and President Obama came close to a "Grand Bargain" on a wide scale bipartisan deficit-reduction plan. The outline of that plan did not raise taxes, but reportedly found up to $800 billion in new revenue by closing tax loopholes and eliminating deductions. The plan also called for entitlement reform with changes to Medicare and Social Security.

On Nov. 11th, Bob Woodward presented the White House’s final offer from that time on Meet the Press:

"This is a confidential document, last offer the president -- the White House made last year to Speaker Boehner to try to reach this $4 trillion grand bargain. And it's long and it's tedious and it's got budget jargon in it. But what it shows is a willingness to cut all kinds of things, like TRICARE, which is the sacred health insurance program for the military, for military retirees; to cut Social Security; to cut Medicare. And there are some lines in there about, "We want to get tax rates down, not only for individuals but for businesses."  So Obama and the White House were willing to go quite far."

GOP aides tell NBC News that a central tenet of the GOP strategy in these current negotiations is to remind the president of just how far he was willing to go in July of 2011, especially when it comes to entitlements.

Today, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said there’s been “little progress” on the fiscal cliff and claimed that Social Security would not be part of any deal. A Democratic aide tells NBC News that their early strategy centers upon not capitulating to intransigent GOP demands regarding tax rates.

As the adage goes, elections have consequences. And Democrats believe that Obama's re-election -- as well as picking up additional Senate and House seats -- has strengthened their negotiating hand. After all, those 2011 "grand bargain" negotiations came after the GOP's thumping of Democrats in the 2010 midterms.

Still, one component of the talks that GOP aides circle back to -- if President Obama truly wants to accomplish big things in his second term (such as immigration reform or an infrastructure bank), how these "fiscal cliff" negotiations go will set a precedent for future cooperation.

Their feeling is that the president’s tone this Friday during his first public rally regarding the fiscal cliff will be telling of how conciliatory he’ll be in the talks.

Mia Love sees the campaign that President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden are conducting as “disrespectful,” quoting the so-called “war on women,” and Biden’s recent comments on the campaign trail when he told a crowd that Republicans “want to put ya’ll back in chains.” 

“Well, when you think about it, let's look at the 'war on women,' I mean, he's tries to politically get women to vote for men,” the Utah congressional candidate said. “And if you think about Joe Biden's comments, "They want to put ya'll back in chains," I think it's absolutely disrespectful to the office that they hold. I deserve a president that sees me as a human being.”

But Love feels that her race won’t be a factor in her effort to become the Republican’s first African-American congresswoman, saying that her race and gender “doesn’t matter.” 

Asked how the Republican Party reaches out to groups its struggling with like African Americans, Latinos, women, and young voters, Love said the GOP just needs to focus on what she says American’s care about, which is the economy.

“I think that what they need to do is continue doing what the Republicans are doing right now, what Mitt Romney is doing, and that's focusing on the economy,” Love said. “That's what people really care about.”

Updated 2:34 p.m. - Democrats are no doubt thrilled by Thursday's Supreme Court ruling upholding the president's health care reform law.

So thrilled, that House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is throwing a party for select Democratic staffers on Capitol Hill.

NBC News obtained the following invitation sent out this morning a few hours after the decision:

Nancy Pelosi
Democratic Leader
United States House of Representatives

requests the pleasure of your company at a reception honoring today's victory on the Supreme Court decision to uphold the Affordable Care Act on Thursday, the twenty  eighth day of June, two thousand twelve at five o'clock in the afternoon

Leader's Conference Room
United States Capitol

A Pelosi aide adds: "This reception will consist of Costco cake and brownie bites. No taxpayer dollars being spent, very informal." No alcohol will be served.

Count House Speaker John Boehner as being a “nay” on New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s plan to ban the sale of large sugary drinks to combat obesity.

The speaker, an admitted chain smoker and Merlot connoisseur, issued a harsh rebuke to Bloomberg’s idea at his morning press conference at the Capitol.

Responding to a question from NBC News Boehner said, “I like Mayor Bloomberg, but are you kidding me!? You look, come on, don't we have bigger issues to deal with than the size of some soft drink that somebody buys?”

Boehner’s view echoes many of those on the right that feel Bloomberg’s plan is the ultimate example of the overreaching “nanny state.”

A congressional aide said there are no plans on either side to institute a federal ban on the sale of large soft drinks.

House Speaker John Boehner offered a rare glimpse Tuesday into his summer 2011 negotiations with President Obama on a "grand bargain" to rein in spending and address mounting debt.

The Ohio Republican reflected on how the spending fight that plagued Washington last year would affect his legacy, and hinted that he would make another attempt at extracting reforms by using the nation's borrowing limit as a bargaining chip.

In a speech at a Washington conference at fiscal issues, Boehner called the time span between Election Day and the end of the year, during which Congress must address expiring tax cuts and a looming hike in the debt limit, an "action-forcing event."

Boehner spoke of himself in historical terms and seemed to recognize a far-reaching debt deal could cement his legacy as an effective speaker.

“I’m ready, and I’ve been ready. I’m not angling for higher office. This is the last position in government I will hold. I haven’t come this far to walk away," he said. "All my life, I’ve operated by a simple code: if you do the right thing for the reasons, good things will happen. Well, NOW is the time to do the right thing."

Achieving the "right thing" might involve a bipartisan deal along the lines Boehner and President Obama had negotiated during the height of the debt ceiling showdown. But gridlock in Congress, driven by hard-charging conservatives and a deep chasm between the Republican House and the Democratic Senate, has shown that such a deal would be easier said than done.

Boehner's pronouncement that he's seeking no further office, combined with Obama's sentiment that this election is his last, could open the door to a new agreement between the two leaders.

But Boehner also decried the way in which Obama had allegedly "moved the goalposts" during their 2011 talks.

“We were on the verge of an agreement that would have reduced the deficit by trillions, by strengthening entitlement programs and reforming the tax code with permanently lower rates for all, laying the foundation for lasting growth," he said. "But when the president saw his former colleagues in the Senate getting ready to press for tax hikes, he lost his nerve.  The political temptation was too great.  He moved the goalposts, changed his stance, and demanded tax hikes.”

The White House has contended that Boehner never had the GOP votes to achieve a true bipartisan compromise because House Republicans would be reluctant to accept any increase in taxes.