U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner and House Speaker John Boehner hardened their positions over the fiscal cliff, each blaming the other for a standoff that could lead to more than $600 billion in tax increases and spending cuts in January.
Geithner said Republicans in Congress will be responsible for hurting the economy if they refuse to raise tax rates on the highest-income earners as part of a deal.
“There’s not going to be an agreement without rates going up,” Geithner said in a taped interview that aired today on CNN’s “State of the Union.” Republicans will “own the responsibility for the damage” if they “force higher rates on virtually all Americans because they’re unwilling to let tax rates go up on 2 percent of Americans.”
I would say we're nowhere, period. -- House Speaker John Boehner
Republican Boehner said the White House is wasting time.
“I would say we’re nowhere, period,” Boehner said on the “Fox News Sunday” program. “We’ve put a serious offer on the table by putting revenues up there to try to get this question resolved. But the White House has responded with virtually nothing.”
Compromise Fading
The comments followed a week of political jockeying signaling that post-election optimism over a compromise, expressed by Republicans and President Barack Obama, a Democrat, is fading. Both sides are resuming positions that have defined the debate over higher taxes on the top 2 percent of earners and cuts in government spending. If there’s no agreement by the end of this month, the tax increases and spending cuts will start taking effect.
There’s “clearly a chance” that there won’t be an agreement in time to avert the fiscal cliff, Boehner said on the Fox program.
Geithner appeared on five talk shows today. In the interviews, taped Nov. 30, he challenged Republicans to make a counteroffer to the Obama administration’s framework plan.
The Obama plan is to trade $600 billion in cuts for $1.6 trillion in tax increases, primarily targeting families with more than $250,000 in annual income. It also includes $800 billion in assumed savings from the winding down of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“The ball really is with them now,” said Geithner, the administration’s lead negotiator on the fiscal cliff, on CNN. “They’re having a tough time trying to figure out what they can do, what they can get support from their members for.”
