Paul Ryan Claims ‘No Leadership’ From Democrats On Budget Cuts

Paul Ryan (R-WI) claims there is “no leadership” form Democrats on how to avoid the automatic budget cuts, called the “sequester,” which are set to take place on March 1.

Ryan, the House Budget Committee Chair, blamed both the White House and Senate Democrats for the lack of agreement in Congress.

Ryan claimed, “There’s no leadership on the other side of the aisle and therefore no agreement,” reports Yahoo! News.

The former Republican vice presidential nominee made the comments on ABC’s This Week on Sunday morning. During the interview, Ryan also rejected a proposal by Senate Democrats. The proposal would avoid the pending cuts, including new tax revenues from closing existing loopholes.

In explaining why the Democrats’ plan would not work, Paul Ryan stated:

“I’d be curious to see if they could actually pass that, number one. Number two, the president got his tax increases last year. He got those higher revenues.”

ABC News notes that newly-appointed White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough also spoke on This Week about the pending sequester. McDonough asserted that finding savings in the federal budget is “not impossible.” He also stressed the need to create a “balanced” package that would protect the middle class.

Along with his thoughts on the sequester, Paul Ryan also spoke about his work on a budget that will balance in 10 years. The new proposal would require even more spending cuts than what his previous budgets have had. Ryan added:

“I’m very comfortable with the fact that we will produce a budget that balances. The reason we want to do this is not simply to make numbers add up; we want to prevent a debt crisis, we want to grow the economy.”

Do you agree with Paul Ryan’s claims that there is “no leadership” from Democrats on the impending budget cuts?

[Image by Tony Alter (Flickr: Congressman Paul Ryan (R,Wisconsin)) [CC-BY-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons]