Real estate mogul Donald Trump blasted Republicans negotiators on Monday, saying that President Obama "would have folded liked a deck of cards" had they better leveraged themselves in the "fiscal cliff" negotiations.
"Well, I’m a Republican and I will tell you, I’m so disappointed in what the Republicans are doing," Trump said. "I’m so disappointed in their negotiating ability and what happened recently."
The reality television host, who briefly considered seeking the GOP presidential nomination in 2012, said he had hoped the two sides would have struck a grand bargain on the deficit, under which Republicans would trade an extension of the debt-ceiling limit for greater concessions on spending cuts and taxes.
“You have the debt ceiling coming up, which they should have put into this package," Trump said. "Not waited a month or two months. And you have all of these things coming up and Obama would have folded. A hundred percent. As sure as you’re sitting there, Obama would have folded like a deck of cards. He had no choice.”
Trump warned that the "step-by-step" strategy being employed resulted in Republicans "losing each step of the way."
"Now you see what’s going on with others and Nancy Pelosi saying, 'Well, that was just one tax raise,' " Trump said. " 'Now we’re going to do it again.' And they could have wrapped it up and it could have been a beautiful package and they could have had all the cards and I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t know who these negotiators are, but they’re, like, the worst I’ve ever seen.”
On Monday, Democrats indicated they hoped to raise as much as $1 trillion in new tax revenue through the elimination of loopholes and deductions as a counter to Republican demands for spending cuts. Republicans have argued tax reform should be revenue-neutral, dropping overall rates if certain deductions are eliminated.
