As tradition requires, House Speaker John Boehner invited the president to speak to a joint session of Congress. The White House accepted.
Boehner says a letter to Obama that Republicans "welcome the opportunity to hear your new ideas for working with Congress."
There's much work to be done on Capitol Hill before the president's speech.
Obama and congressional Republicans right now are struggling to wrap up final business on spending bills and on an extension of a payroll tax cut.
Boehner says that as Congress and the White House try to accomplish all that, "we must also look ahead for new opportunities to put solutions before politics."
