Republicans won't compromise on budget to avert government shutdown: Sen. Charles Schumer
Wednesday, February 23rd 2011, 4:00 AM
Applewhite/AP
House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and the Senate Budget Committee's top Republican, Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama, right, deliver GOP response to President Obama's budget last week.
Somodevilla/Getty
Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) said the Republicans won't compromise to avoid a government shutdown. With the battle over spending cuts getting more heated and the threat of a government shutdown looming closer when funding runs out March 4, Schumer and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid held a hastily arranged conference call to complain the GOP has nixed their latest offer to negotiate a deal.
"Leader Reid offered an olive branch to House Republicans and they flatly rejected him," Schumer said.
That olive branch amounted to a reminder that Senate Democrats passed the current funding resolution last December that's already $41 billion less than President Obama wanted, and a promise to seek deeper cuts in return for a 30-day temporary spending bill to keep the government going beyond next week.
"Now we are saying to Republicans, we’re willing to go deeper," Schumer said. "We’re willing to sit down and negotiate and look beyond the $41 billion and find extra cuts to take us through the year.
"The House Republicans are saying that’s not good enough," Schumer fumed. "The House Pepublicans won’t take yes for an answer."
Earlier, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) charged that it was the Democrats who were pushing a government shutdown by refusing to take up the House's bill that cuts $61 billion from last year's spending levels..
"Senate Democrat Leader Harry Reid has yet to offer a plan and instead almost seems as though he’s hoping for a government shutdown to occur for political gain," Cantor said. "Let me be clear, a government shutdown is not an acceptable outcome, and I call upon Leader Reid to commit to a good faith effort to work with us and take that threat off the table."
Schumer argued that if there's bad faith, it's in being unwilling to accept a 30-day extension so the two sides can talk.
"They want cuts right now on their terms before negotiations take place," he said. "It’s not an act of good faith, it’s an act of a group that will not be satisfied with anything less than a shutdown of the government."
He and Reid took issue with the threat of a shutdown coming from them, as well.
“We are taking it off the table. They have refused to do it," Schumer said. "They have been asked repeatedly on television… they won’t. We have."
No comments:
Post a Comment