Media Stakeout With House Minority Leader John Boehner And Senator Minority Leader Mitch McConnell

Press Conference

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REP. BOEHNER: Now, most of my constituents are wondering how long the spending binge is going to go on here in Washington. I heard about it all last weekend. And all we have to do is look at the budget being proposed by President Obama, and it's clear that it spends too much, it borrows too much and it taxes too much.

And the result of this is that we're going to have less jobs in America at a time when we're looking to create more jobs in America. And as the federal budget grows, only one thing can happen to the family budget, and that is, it's going to shrink. You can't have a growing federal budget and a growing family budget. It doesn't work that way.

That's why Republicans are going to continue to offer better solutions by allowing the American people and small businesses to keep more of what they earn. At the end of the day, that will create more jobs in America and help get our economy moving again.

Mitch?

SEN. MCCONNELL: Well, John, you're absolutely right that the new budget spends too much, taxes too much and borrows too much. But if you look at the record of the first 50 days of this new administration, if you add up how much we've spent so far, a combination of the stimulus package and the omnibus bill, we're spending in the first 50 days of this new administration at the rate of a billion dollars an hour.

This spending spree needs to come to an end. And, you know, they have argued that the spending to date is because they inherited problems. Well, the difference between that argument and the budget is the budget is their blueprint for what we should do now and in the future -- the new plan for the new administration. And John Boehner's absolutely right when he says it spends too much, it taxes too much and it borrows too much.

Q And how do each of you react to President Obama's announcement about earmarks?

REP. BOEHNER: Well, I think the president missed a golden opportunity today to really fulfill his campaign commitment to not sign bills that have a lot of wasteful spending and are overburdened with earmarks. And it's easy to say, well, it was last year's business. But this is a new Congress and he is our new president.

We had to send the bill to him and he's the president and can sign it or veto it. So he missed a great opportunity.

And if you look at the earmark reforms that he proposed, you know, the question I ask is where's the beef? Where's the reform? I just don't see it.

SEN. MCCONNELL: Well, let me tell you, what was clearly not last year's business was plussing the bill up 8 percent, which is twice the rate of inflation. This bill was not last year's business. It was last year's business plus an additional 8 percent spending. Further illustrates my point that when you add up the stimulus and omnibus, we've been spending in the first 50 days of this administration at the rate of a billion dollars an hour.

Q (Off mike.)

SEN. MCCONNELL: You know, giving the president more rescission authority, he already has it. All he has to do is put the rescissions together, send them back up here.

But at the end of the day, I think Congress itself needs to reform this process. I think we can reform it. And we ought to have an earmark moratorium this year, for the balance of this year, and allow members on both sides of the Capitol, Democrat and Republican to sit down and make this process much more transparent and accountable.

Q What do you each make of talk from Pelosi and Obey about the need for a second stimulus, maybe work starting already on a second stimulus?

SEN. MCCONNELL: Well, it sounds eerily reminiscent of Japan in the '90s. As we all know, they passed numerous fiscal stimulus bills frequently throughout the decade of the '90s. And at the end of the decade, I'm sure that they had done some good. You can't spend that much money without doing some good. But the Japanese economy looked very much like it did at the beginning of the decade.

So, you know, my members are highly skeptical that we can spend our way out of this particular problem.

REP. BOEHNER: Let me just -- let me review the bidding of what's happened thus far this year. We had an $810 billion -- or nearly $800 billion stimulus bill, a $410 billion omnibus appropriation bill. We have before us a $3.7 trillion budget for this fiscal year. We have several trillion dollars that the Treasury Department or the Fed has loaned to banks. And now they want to spend more money?

There is some point at which we will bury our economy under a mountain of debt. And we will clearly bury our kids and their kids under a mountain of debt.

At the end of the day, government growing, government spending is not going to solve this problem.

It's the American people and the business community that are going to solve the problem. But we have to allow them to keep more of their hard-earned money. Then we can get this economy moving again.

(Cross talk.)

SEN. MCCONNELL: At the rate we're going, we're going to double the national debt in 5 years and triple it in 10 years. I don't think anybody seriously thinks that that's a good idea.

Thanks.

Q (Off mike) -- House Republicans and Senate Republicans going to propose your alternative budgets? And would they call for a spending increase?

REP. BOEHNER: We're going to go talk about it right now.

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