Tea Party Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) opened the door Tuesday to a compromise on extending the paroll tax cut, saying he would be willing to vote separately on a controversial provision on the Keystone XL pipeline.
“I think the pipeline actually passes on a straight up-or-down vote, let's have that vote. If they want to separate it, separate it out, and make we’ll make it a separate vote, and we won’t make the payroll tax contingent on it.”
The House Tuesday passed a version of the payroll tax extension that included language that would expedite a decision from the administration on the pipeline, which was recently delayed. A spokesman for the State Department on Monday warned "an arbitrary deadline" would prevent the department from being able to approve the project at all.
Earlier in the interview, Paul explained that he was opposed to decreasing revenues to the Social Security trust fund supported by the payroll tax but, “I’m willing to go along with this if it’s paid for and if it will create some jobs.”
