McConnell Reiterates Support of Boehner Plan, Blasts Obama

JEWEL SAMAD/AFP/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) -- Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY., reiterated Wednesday on the Senate floor his “strong support” for Speaker of the House John Boehner’s debt plan and blasted President Obama for threatening a potential veto should the plan pass both in the House and the Senate.

“The White House issued a statement of administration policy which said that when the legislation Speaker Boehner is now revising reaches the president's desk, unnamed senior advisors will recommend that the president veto [it]. I have a question for those senior advisors: What about this legislation is so offensive that you'd rather see the nation default on its debts than have the sign president it into law?”

McConnell asked if the optics the White House wants to send is: “do they really intend to suggest that he veto the nation into default for political reasons?”

Again, McConnell questioned where the president’s plan is -- noting that “Congress can’t vote on a speech, and a veto threat won’t prevent default.”

“I remain as committed as ever to resolving this crisis in a way that will allow us to avoid default without raising taxes and to cut spending without budget gimmicks. There’s only one option that does that, and that's the one Speaker Boehner has proposed and that is being improved as we speak.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV., took advantage of Speaker Boehner’s setback with Tuesday’s CBO score of the House plan, quipping that Boehner pushed back the vote by one day, “because his legislation didn’t even have the support of Republicans in his own chamber.”  

But he said that no one needs "to worry" about the Boehner plan because it will not pass.

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