Yesterday, First District Congressman Paul Ryan spoke with Jay Weber about the impact of the sequester and the need to offer solutions that balance the budget and pay down our debt.

Podcast Highlights

The President has the tools to mitigate the damaging effects of sequestration

“What the President prefers to do is go around the country putting out this parade of horrible and awful things that will happen. That is not necessarily true and it does not have to happen – unless he chooses to use these things as a game. He is getting this week, and he has known that he is going to get this, the flexibility to distribute these cuts to lower priority spending areas from higher priority spending areas. We have already reached agreement on national security spending so that we are making sure that there is no damage to national security.”

Rep. Ryan on the importance of prioritizing the fiscal well-being of our country

“The point is that we have to get spending under control. We are spending three dollars for every two dollars that we take in. It is bringing us to a debt crisis. It is hurting our economy today. It is destroying our children’s future. You need leaders to stand up and make leadership decisions. We have done that, and the President is out campaigning. So that is the frustration. When push comes to shove, as you see the sequester taking place, we are showing that you can use a scrapple to go after waste instead of a meat ax to cut across the board. The question is, will the President use it or not?”

Tax reform as a mechanism to pay down the debt rather than to fuel unsustainable spending

“The point I am making is that all those loopholes that we need to close, which we have been advocating closing for years, has to go towards lowering our tax rates for economic growth and job creation. If you close loopholes to send the money to Washington, then it simply fuels a higher spending line. That is what the President thinks that tax reform is; a revenue generating exercise. We see tax reform as an economic growth, job creation exercise. If you say, send it to pay down the debt, it is really kind of another way of saying, do that instead of spending.”

House Republicans are willing to share in the success of balancing the budget with the President

“If we get this fixed then I do not care if President Obama gets credit. Good things happen to the country; that is what matters. We are going to use our leverage to get this kind of outcome to get a down payment on cutting the budget, to balance the budget, and reforming entitlement programs. We want to get cuts and reforms that get us on a path to balancing the budget. That would be a great legacy and we are going to help him get it.”