Natalie Gonnella
Although congressional Republicans are somewhat pleased that President Obama is finally "joining the discussion" to address the country's overwhelming fiscal crises, they remain skeptical about his soon-to-be (re)released debt reduction plan, which is rumored to reiterate the Administration's previous calls for tax hikes on wealthy Americans.
With less than an hour to go before the President's speech, here's a quick look at what GOP leaders have had to say about about their expectations for this afternoon's statement:
I’m pleased the President has finally joined the discussion, but the Ryan budget has set the bar...[I]f the President begins the discussion by saying we must increase taxes on the American people – as his budget does - my response will be clear: tax increases are unacceptable and are a nonstarter. We don’t have deficits because Americans are taxed too little, we have deficits because Washington spends too much. And, at a time when the American people face skyrocketing prices at the pump, energy tax hikes are a particularly bad idea...The President needs to demonstrate leadership and show American families and small businesses that he is serious about addressing Washington’s spending problem. I’m hopeful that he will use his speech to provide specific solutions, rather than more empty promises.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell
The truth is, the President is only entering this debate at all because he can no longer ignore the growing bipartisan calls for action. If he were serious, he’d be talking about a detailed roadmap for action, not just grabbing headlines by announcing another speech.
“Of course, we can hope that the President presents more than just his vision for the future this afternoon. But those who’ve hoped for that from this president have been disappointed many times before.
No doubt we’ll also get a fair share of finger-pointing, and an attempt to cast Republicans in the worst possible light for actually laying out a serious plan to address the crises we face while others merely talk about their vision. But we can still hope that the President leaves the scapegoating aside for a change, and finally admits the obvious: that we can only solve these fiscal crises if we do so together.
So either the President agrees today that Republicans have a point when it comes to the seriousness of our fiscal problems and admits that the old approach of pretending they don’t exist won’t work anymore, or those problems will become harder and harder to solve.
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor:
He’s been standing on the sidelines expecting the rest of us to make the tough decisions to lead this country...I hope we don’t have a re-do and a do-over on the tax agreement that we came to last December. Again, this was an issue that was litigated in the election last fall, and as we approach tax day in a few days in this country it is just foreign to most people that we’re going to address our problems by raising taxes on the very people we expect to jump back into the game to create jobs, and those are our small business people.
House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy:
[The President] is just trying to reframe [the debate] because his first movie didn't work, so now he's filming the sequel...In history, the sequel isn't as good as the first one, and the first one was already a box office bomb...What I see is the president losing the argument. When in modern history have you seen a president trying to redefine a new budget?
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