Hoyer Discusses Need to Compromise on Long-Term, Balanced Agreement to Pay America's Bills, Reduce the Deficit on CNBC



WASHINGTON, DC - House Democratic Whip Steny H. Hoyer (MD) discussed the need to find compromise on a long-term, balanced agreement to pay our nation's bills and the reduce the deficit on CNBC's Squawk Box. See below for excerpts and a link to the video.

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"We see a deeply divided party on the Republican side of the aisle who knew this crisis was coming. I advised in April as we sat around the be the Cabinet table with the President we ought to solve this problem by the first of June and not push this country to the brink of default. Unfortunately, every effort to do that has been rejected. Every effort, every meeting, every conference that's looked for compromise, the Republicans have walked out… What the Speaker now sees is that his own members have walked out on him."
"Any honest observer, very frankly, would say the Reid plan which has at least 53 votes, the majority of the United States Senate… But it's essentially what Speaker Boehner set forth in his New York speech. It has no taxes in it. We think there ought to be revenues. So, I think it's not a fair observation to say the Democrats have not put something on table that, in fact, is a very, very substantial step towards the Republicans to try to solve this crisis. But the Republicans have said no. They cannot say yes to their own proposal."
"The Republicans have to come to the table and compromise. Very frankly, an awful lot of people on our side of the aisle think the President and Democrats have gone way too far towards the Republicans already. So, you know, we keep moving. Every day, every week, every month, and we don't get there. The Republicans walk out of the room. Then people like yourselves say ‘well, geez whiz what more can you do?’ Well, we can put up the flag of surrender. We can see Medicare and Social Security savaged. We could see domestic spending savaged. We don't intend to do that."
"The onus ought to be on the Republicans… You’ve got to compromise. We have to compromise. I would suggest we have gone a long way towards compromise, and just because we don't go the final step and jump off the precipice with our Republican colleagues on bad policy that doesn't mean we haven't sat down at the table. This President sat down at the table to get the compromise longer than any president in the 30 years that I’ve been in congress… There has been no attempt to reach across the aisle to say to me or to Leader Pelosi, ‘look, how can we come to an agreement? How can we get to a majority? We don't have a majority on our side.’ There's no attempt. Why? Because they want to do it their way or no way."



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