House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy said Tuesday that Republicans will not try to lift “sequester” limits during the annual spending process because the caps are written into law and they view President Obama as an uncooperative negotiator.
Mr. McCarthy, California Republican, argued Mr. Obama would seek tax hikes to get around the limits both parties agreed to in 2011, and “that’s not gonna happen.”
“I don’t believe that we can make that change while he’s still there,” he told reporters.
The White House has warned Republicans not to forge ahead with the annual spending process without reconsidering the mandatory caps, saying Mr. Obama wants matching increases for defense and non-defense priorities and that sequestration was never supposed to take effect, anyway.
But Mr. McCarthy said the House will begin Wednesday to consider the pair of fiscal 2016 bills that have made it through the Appropriations Committee. He also wants to vote on the GOP’s final budget resolution Thursday, although negotiators from the House and Senate have yet to announce a final deal.
Congress has struggled in recent years to complete the annual appropriations process, relying on short-term spending resolutions instead, so Republican leaders want to get a head start on the 12 spending bills that must wind through the committee process before hitting the floor.
“This is why you start earlier,” Mr. McCarthy said, boasting that lawmakers are starting the appropriations process earlier than any Congress since 1974.
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, is already accusing Republicans of shutting Democrats out of the process.
“Republican majorities in the House and Senate haven’t even bothered to make a show of finding bipartisan consensus,” he said Tuesday, referring to negotiations over the non-binding budget. “Any meetings they’ve had with Democrats have been strictly ’pro forma,’ without any real input from the other side.”
Speaker John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican, left the door open last week to a type of bipartisan deal that Rep. Paul Ryan, Wisconsin Republican, and Sen. Patty Murray, Washington Democrat, struck in late 2013 to avert a government shutdown and ease the sequester limits on defense and domestic programs.
Mr. McCarthy, though, said the caps “will hold” and that his party is trying to balance the budget while staying within mandatory constraints.
“I just assume that Democrats will abide by what current law is,” he said.
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.