Urges White House to Accept Responsibility for Debt Crisis and Embrace Fiscal Reforms

Contact: Matt Lloyd, 202-226-4379; mikepence.house.gov 

WASHINGTON, July 12, 2011 /Standard Newswire/ -- U.S. Congressman Mike Pence delivered the following speech on the House floor today regarding debt ceiling negotiations:

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"Well, negotiations over the nation's debt ceiling have reached an impasse.  After more than two years in office, trillions of dollars in borrowing and spending and bailouts, and takeovers, the president now says the failure to reach an agreement is because of Republicans in the Congress, Republicans who were in the minority in the last Congress, in fact.

"The president says because Republicans in Washington haven't fully realized that the philosophy of politics does not work in governing. He's telling us to 'eat our peas.'

"Ok, the president basically is saying that Congress owns the problem. But that's not what he said five years ago.

"Explaining his opposition to raising the debt ceiling, then-Senator Barack Obama said, 'The fact that we are here today raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure.' He said that doing so weakens us domestically. He said, 'Leadership means "the buck stops here." America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership.'

"He said 'Americans deserve better.'  Well I say, Senator Obama, you were right.

"When the U.S. government can't pay its bills, it's not only a debt problem.  It is a failure of leadership at the presidential level, just as you said. The truth is, it's the president's problem.

"If President Obama wants to raise the debt ceiling, he should recognize that it's his responsibility, it's his problem and come to the Congress and ask us to step forward and help him solve that problem by cutting spending now, capping spending and sending a Balanced Budget Amendment to the states."