Eric Cantor: We Must Get Our Fiscal House In Order Without Raising Taxes VIDEO

WASHINGTON, D.C. – House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) today called on President Obama to release the details of his “grand plan” that he proposed for a debt limit increase:

“Today we will continue meetings at the White House to try to find consensus surrounding the debt limit. Though none of the plans being discussed right now could garner the 218 votes needed for House passage, we have found areas of agreement. I am glad the President has finally agreed that Medicare as we know it will be bankrupt within 10 years unless we do something about it, and I am glad he has agreed that we need to address our debt crisis now. As we move forward in this debate, I would ask that we work in earnest on these areas of commonality instead of demanding that areas of agreement are tied to items of fundamental disagreement like raising taxes. The President refuses to compromise on the repeal of ObamaCare, and House Republicans refuse to raise taxes, so both have been ruled out. Further, the simple reality is that tax increases cannot pass the House, and the constant demand for them makes coalescing around any increase in the debt limit less likely.

"Currently, there is not a single debt limit proposal that can pass the House of Representatives, but I believe the path forward is to focus on what we can agree upon, and though it doesn’t go as far as our budget, House Republicans can likely agree with the general spending cuts and entitlement changes in the ‘big deal’ proposed by the President. That isn’t everything that we want, as the President’s proposal appears to be around $3 trillion in spending cuts, compared to the reforms and the more than $6 trillion in cuts House Republicans supported in the Ryan budget. I also believe that the President should release the basic framework and details of his spending cuts so that both Republicans and Democrats can make well informed decisions about something of this magnitude. To date, we have not seen the details of his plan and we must be able to – the stakes are too high for anything less."

TEXT CREDIT: Eric Cantor Majority Leader Office of the Majority Leader H-329, The Capitol House of Representatives P: 202.225.4000

VIDEO and IMAGE CREDIT: EricCantor