McConnell: Democrats’ budget would be ‘a disaster’

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Wednesday that Budget Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray’s (D-Wash.) budget would be “a disaster for our country.”

“A budget like that would be a disaster for our country,” McConnell said on the Senate floor Wednesday, the same day Murray’s committee began consideration of her budget. “I’m calling on my Democrat friends to shelve the extremist liberal budget we’ve been hearing so much about.”

Murray’s budget includes a reconciliation of nearly $1 trillion in new tax revenue, but Republicans have said they are unwilling to raise taxes anymore this year.  

“I hope Democrats offer something serious tonight,” McConnell said. “I hope they face up to the fact that they already got the revenue they’re going to get, so that they can start dealing with the real issues that are leading us to fiscal ruin.”

Murray has said her budget takes a "balanced" approach by including both tax revenue and spending cuts.

Senate leaders highlighted the party divisions on budget issues Wednesday.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) also continued his criticisms of House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) budget, which was released Tuesday. 

“This is the same budget plan we saw from Congressman Ryan last year and the year before that,” Reid said Wednesday. “Even the name is the same. If anything, this new version is even more extreme than the last two Ryan Republican budget proposals — proposals that sought to end the Medicare guarantee and raise taxes on middle class families all while handing out more tax breaks to the wealthy.”

Ryan’s budget calls for $5.7 trillion in spending cuts and would cut the top tax rate to 25 percent and balance the budget in 10 years.

Reid said Ryan’s plan “guts” programs for the middle class in order to give tax breaks to the wealthy.

“These drastic cuts will literally cost lives,” Reid said. “They will also cost jobs. Instead of a balanced approach that protects the American economy, the Ryan Republican budget guts education, medical research, infrastructure and public safety. The Ryan Republican plan would actually jeopardize the economic recovery.”

Reid wants to start floor work on Murray’s budget next week in order to pass it before the Easter recess.

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