GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney in an interview on NBC's “Meet
the Press” airing Sunday criticizes GOP leaders, including his own
running mate Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), for agreeing to the August 2011
debt-ceiling deal.
Romney was asked about the $109 billion automatic spending cut known as the sequester that is due to hit in January. Some $55 billion comes from the defense budget.
The GOP candidate blasts President Obama for proposing the cuts, which were floated as a way to force the failed debt supercommittee to strike a deal last fall.
“I want to maintain defense spending at the current level of the GDP. I don't want to keep bringing it down as the president's doing. This sequestration idea of the White House, which is cutting our defense, I think is an extraordinary miscalculation in the wrong direction,” Romney says.
Pressed on the votes of House leaders, including Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Ryan, in favor of the deal, Romney says that was a “big mistake.”
“I thought it was a mistake on the part of the White House to propose it. I think it was a mistake for Republicans to go along with it,” he adds.
The debt-ceiling deal was forged by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Vice President Joe Biden hours before the United States was set to exceed its debt ceiling and begin defaulting on its obligations.
Republicans had used the debt ceiling to try to force Obama to rein in spending and later touted the $2.2 trillion in spending reductions including those in the sequester. The House last spring passed a bill to replace the automatic cuts with a series of cuts to social programs but Democrats have balked because the measure does not contain new taxes.
Read more: http://thehill.com/video/campaign/248307-romney-criticizes-gop-leaders-over-debt-ceiling-deal-
Romney was asked about the $109 billion automatic spending cut known as the sequester that is due to hit in January. Some $55 billion comes from the defense budget.
The GOP candidate blasts President Obama for proposing the cuts, which were floated as a way to force the failed debt supercommittee to strike a deal last fall.
“I want to maintain defense spending at the current level of the GDP. I don't want to keep bringing it down as the president's doing. This sequestration idea of the White House, which is cutting our defense, I think is an extraordinary miscalculation in the wrong direction,” Romney says.
Pressed on the votes of House leaders, including Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Ryan, in favor of the deal, Romney says that was a “big mistake.”
“I thought it was a mistake on the part of the White House to propose it. I think it was a mistake for Republicans to go along with it,” he adds.
The debt-ceiling deal was forged by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Vice President Joe Biden hours before the United States was set to exceed its debt ceiling and begin defaulting on its obligations.
Republicans had used the debt ceiling to try to force Obama to rein in spending and later touted the $2.2 trillion in spending reductions including those in the sequester. The House last spring passed a bill to replace the automatic cuts with a series of cuts to social programs but Democrats have balked because the measure does not contain new taxes.
Read more: http://thehill.com/video/campaign/248307-romney-criticizes-gop-leaders-over-debt-ceiling-deal-
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