President Barack Obama ripped the House Republican budget a day after its release, asserting that if it were food it would be a “stinkburger” or a “meanwich.”
President Barack Obama speaks about his proposal to raise the federal minimum wage at the University of Michigan on April 2, 2014 in Ann Arbor, Michigan. (Getty Images/Joshua Lott)
He also explained that the GOP is "not necessarily cold-hearted," but accused the party of seeking to make life more difficult for children, mothers and college students.
“Just yesterday, Republicans in Congress put forward a budget for the country that I believe would shrink opportunity for your generation,” Obama told students at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Mich. “It starts by giving a massive tax cut to households making more than $1 million a year, the very folks who benefited the most over the last 20 years from this economy that is benefiting people at the top.”
Obama tacked off a list of problems that would be created by the budget proposal announced Tuesday by House Budget Committee Chairman Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.).
“When they put these budgets together, they don't tell you exactly what they cut because they know you wouldn't like it, so you have to kind of do the math,” Obama said. “But if they cut everything they're talking about, within a few years, 170,000 kids would get cut from early childhood education, and new moms would be cut off from funding to help them get free food. Funding for thousands of special education teachers would be cut off. If they wanted to make smaller cuts in any one of these areas, they would have to make bigger cuts in others. It even puts Pell Grants, which makes it harder for students to pay for a college education.
Obama mocked Republicans for again proposing to eliminate the Affordable Care Act, his signature legislative achievement, which the administration says that 7.1 million have signed up for.
“They're not necessarily cold-hearted,” Obama said. “They just sincerely believe that if we give more tax breaks to a fortunate few, and we invest less in the middle class, and we reduce or eliminate the safety net for the poor and the sick, and we cut food stamps and we cut Medicaid and we let banks and polluters and credit card companies and insurers do only what's best for their bottom line, without responsibility to the rest of us, then somehow the economy will boom and jobs and prosperity will trickle down to everybody.”
“When I say it that way, I know it sounds like I'm exaggerating, except I'm not,” Obama continued.
Under Ryan’s fiscal year 2015 budget proposal, the federal budget would balance in 10 years, it would cut government spending by $5.1 trillion over a decade, reforms Medicare, tax reform and increases defense spending. The budget proposal projects that economic growth would occur as a result of a balanced budget.
The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office projects 2.5 percent economic growth for the next 10 years. The CBO estimates that a balanced budget would increase economic output by 1.8 percent higher by 2040, which would mean more revenue.
Obama’s budget proposal would attempt to raise revenue through a $1.8 trillion tax increase and $791 billion spending increase over the next 10 years without a projected balanced budget. Senate Democrats have not proposed a budget plan.
