ABC Grills Boehner, a ‘Hostage’ to the Tea Party, on Whether He Can Avoid the ‘Fate’ of Gingrich
According to World News' Diane Sawyer, House Speaker John Boehner is being “held hostage” by the Tea Party. Over two days and two shows, Sawyer and interviewer George Stephanopoulos hit the Republican as captive to an unreasonable base who want to shut down the government. On Thursday's Good Morning America, after Boehner asserted that taxpayer dollars shouldn't fund abortions, Stephanopoulos chided, “If you hold on to that, the White House and Democrats have been very clear, there's no deal. The government is going to shut down.” He didn't make the obvious logical conclusion that the Democrats are being held hostage by a liberal, pro-abortion base. Later, the GMA host reiterated his point, arguing: “You know what the Democrats say. They say they can cut a deal with you. But you don't buck the Tea Party.” In a political warning to the Speaker, Stephanopoulos wondered, “You saw what happened to Speaker Gingrich during a government shutdown. Are you going to avoid that fate?” (What exactly was Gingrich's fate? He was reelected, kept his job through 1998 and the Republicans held the majority until 2006.) On Wednesday's World News, Sawyer spun, ” We keep reading that a lot of people think he's being held hostage, as it were, to the Tea Party inside his own party .” A transcript of the April 7 GMA segment, which aired at 7:06am EDT, follows: GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: You know, that potentially explosive issue of congressional pay is just one of the topics I covered in my exclusive interview with Speaker Boehner. He also took on claims by Democrats that he's kowtowing to the Tea Party. And just hours before that White House meeting, signaled why he wasn't ready to accept president Obama's proposal. SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER: We're fighting for the largest cuts that we can because it will help our economy. STEPHANOPOULOS: But you called for $32 billion in cuts in your original proposal. Now, you're at $33 billion. BOEHNER: George, remember where all this started. The Democrats controlled the House last year. They controlled the Senate. They should have done this budget last year. They couldn't come to an agreement. We're cleaning up last year's mess. STEPHANOPOULOS: When you came in this year, you proposed and your leadership proposed a bill that would cut $32 billion. And now, they're beyond that. Why isn't that good enough? BOEHNER: Well, because the House came up with $100 billion worth of spending cuts. And specific policy riders that have been part of everybody appropriations process. And we send it over to the Senate. It's been 46 days. The Senate has not acted. STEPHANOPOULOS: You mention those policy riders. Some of them include cutting funding for Planned Parenthood. Cutting the enforcement for the Environmental Protection Agency. The President says those have no place in a short-term continuation resolution. Your response? BOEHNER: There's never been an appropriation process where there were
Posted by
on April 7, 2011. Filed under