House Majority Leader Eric Cantor is standing by his position of not raising tax rates as part of a deal with the White House to solve the fiscal cliff.
Some Republicans have said they are open to breaking Grover Norquist’s no-tax-increases pledge, but Cantor said the nation’s financial situation is about much more than the pledge, adding that House Republicans “weren’t elected to raise taxes.”
“There’s a lot that has been said about this pledge, and I will tell you when I go to the constituents that have elected, re-elected me, it is not about that pledge. It really is about trying to solve problems and as we know, this election that we just went through was very much about, number one, what are we going to do to reclaim a momentum in this economy, how do we get us back to that, and two, how do you solve a problem?” Cantor said Monday on MSNBC.
“John Boehner went to the White House 10 days ago and said, hey, Republicans in the House are willing to put revenues on the table. That was a big move, right? And we said we’re going to do that in the name of trying to fix the problems, to respond to the electorate that re-elected this president, but at the same time we say, we weren’t elected to raise taxes. We want to go and help people get back to work.”
Taxes will rise for everyone if congressional leaders do not reach an agreement with the White House before the end of the year. If this occurs, Cantor said these increases still would not solve America’s fiscal challenges. (VIDEO: Graham vows to violate Norquist tax pledge for entitlement reform)
“So again, even if all those taxes go up — and we know it’s like a $4 trillion item over 10 years — well, remember, how much are we spending more than we’re taking in each year? Over a trillion dollars. So even if you raise all those taxes it does not fix your problem, which is — again, that’s what’s changed, the operation of the statute,” Cantor said.
“So we’re trying to actually make things better and say let’s take this opportunity to come together to fix the spending problem, which is why we need both Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and the president to come forward and say, hey, here are our ideas.”