GOP Address: Sen. Johnson, Republicans Dispappointed by Obama’s Economic Policies
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US Senate(WASHINGTON) — Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin delivers this week’s Republican address, marking this week’s Senate vote of 99-0 against a budget amendment represented as President Obama’s budget request.
With a background in private sector accounting and manufacturing, Johnson says that he is used to “getting things done … producing results.”
“But that’s not what’s happening in the United States Senate,” the senator says in the address.
Sen. Johnson lays in to Senate Democrats placing blame on the lawmakers for the Senate’s failure to pass a budget in three years.
“Even though families and most businesses produce budgets to help control their finances, the largest financial entity in the world is operating without one,” he says. “Why? Because Democrats in the Senate refuse to be held accountable. They either don’t have a plan, or they simply do no want their fingerprints on one.”
But, he says, “Republicans have proven that we are willing to be held accountable. Since regaining a majority in the House, Republicans have fulfilled our responsibility every year by passing a budget.”
Johnson says that despite House GOP’s efforts to pass a budget, those attempts have died in the Democratic-controlled Senate. He further points out that the president’s budget has failed repeatedly in both the Senate and House.
“This is a stunning repudiation of his leadership. At a time when America requires sober financial management, President Obama’s fiscal plans have been so unserious, that not a single member of his own party supported them with their vote,” Johnson says.
ABC News’ Jake Tapper reported earlier this week, however, that the most recent “versions” of the president’s budget, rejected in the House and Senate have been called Republican “gimmicks” and stunts by White House officials.
The budget amendment, introduced by Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Miss., and voted down 99-0 in the Senate, proposed many of the same topline numbers, but offered no specifics and appeared to be heavily condensed at just 56 pages long. In fact, the Senate Budget Committee’s top Democrat explained his party’s inability to support this week’s rejected proposal.
“This is the president’s budget,” Sen. Kent Conrad, D-S.D., said referring to the much larger budget proposal offered by President Obama. “This is what Sen. Sessions has presented as being the president’s budget,” referring to the slimmer 56-page document, voted down in the Senate.
“I think it’s readily apparent there is a big difference between the President’s budget, which I hold in my hands, and what Sen. Sessions has presented as being the president’s budget. This is not the president’s budget. So, of course, we’re not going to support it. It’s not what the president proposed,” Conrad said.
Still, Johnson says that without a budget, America’s fiscal house is in “total disarray,” for which President Obama “offers no solutions.”
“If you’re concerned about the financial future of America, these are not encouraging results,” he says.
Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio