McConnell: Big Deficit Deal Is Dead

Top Republican blames White House insistence on tax hikes
By Polly Davis Doig,  Newser Staff
Posted Jul 10, 2011 9:16 AM CDT
Mitch McConnell on Debt Ceiling: Big Deal Is Dead
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell speaks with reporters following a weekly Republican lunch on Capitol Hill, Tuesday, June 28, 2011.   (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Mitch McConnell is jumping right on John Boehner's pronouncement last night that a broad deal on the deficit is impossible, reports Politico. Appearing on Fox News Sunday this morning, the Senate's top Republican said the White House's insistence that a $4 trillion deal be accompanied by tax hikes doomed such a measure.

"It is because everything they've told me and the speaker is that to get a big package would require big tax increases in the middle of an economic situation that’s extraordinarily difficult with 9.2 percent unemployment—we think it’s a terrible idea, it's a job killer," McConnell said. Click for McConnell's current thoughts on making Barack Obama a one-term president. (More Mitch McConnell stories.)

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