Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (Fla.) defended President Obama's fiery speech at a Congressional Black Caucus dinner Saturday.
Wasserman Schultz said she was at the event and that the president's call for his African-American supporters to "stop complaining" and begin fighting was met with "thunderous applause."
Speaking on CBS News's Face the Nation, the congresswoman praised the president's call to action. "President Obama has appealed to the Congressional Black Caucus and the
attendees last night to close ranks, stand behind him, press on to make
sure that we can continue to push for things like passage of the
American Jobs Act," she said.
"The crowd at the Congressional Black Caucus Annual Gala understands that the president has brought us from the brink of disaster where Republicans, under George W. Bush, had brought us to the precipice of economic disaster," said Wasserman Schultz. Obama had taken the country "to now a point where we have the beginning of a turn-around," she added.
Wasserman Schultz though conceded that there was "more to do" and pressed for lawmakers to take up and pass the president's jobs creation legislation.
"We need to come together as a county and focus on a shot in the arm that the American Jobs Act represents. And that's what he was trying to impress upon them last night. " she said.
Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus who appeared on the same broadcast though painted the president’s speech to the CBC as a sign of desperation.
Priebus said Wasserman Schultz and Democrats “can’t escape the facts on where we are on the economy,” blaming the president for the sluggish recovery.
Obama’s “slogan is no longer ‘Hope and Change’ it’s ‘Hey, it could have been worse’,” Priebus said.
“The president is upside-down. In your home state of Florida, he's upside-down, in all the battleground states.” he said to Wasserman Schultz in reference to Obama’s low approval ratings.
This story was updated at 12:38 p.m.
