President Obama has endorsed the budget plan proposed by Speaker John Boehner, according to White House aides, as the troubled Speaker prepares to retire from the House of Representatives.
“We believe this a budget framework that meets the president’s vision,” White House Deputy Press Secretary Eric Schultz told reporters aboard Air Force One yesterday when asked about the House budget proposal.
The plan is Boehner’s final surrender to Obama’s budget demands, because it sets top-level spending limits for the government until March 2017, after the president leaves office. It increases planned spending by $50 billion in 2016, and $30 billion in 2017.
The details of the deal angered conservative critics of Boehner, particularly after he rammed through legislation reauthorizing the Export-Import bank using secretive tactics and capitulated to Obama’s spending demands.
Obama and his staff were “heavily engaged” with the budgetary discussions with Boehner and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, including making several personal calls to party leaders, Schultz revealed.
“Obviously this is a compromise” Schultz explained. “Not everyone in this situation is going to get everything they want.”
Schultz said that Boehner’s budget-plan allocated funding for defense, education, job training while avoiding a government shutdown and removing sequester spending caps, which Obama demanded early on in the discussions.
“We feel like in each of these places, this a budget deal that meets those tests,” Schultz said.
Rep. Paul Ryan, Boehner’s likely replacement for House Speaker, also endorsed the spending plan claiming that it helped Republicans “turn the page” past the Obama presidency.
“It’s time for us to turn the page on the last few years and get to work on a bold agenda that we can take to the American people,” he said in a statement.
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