WASHINGTON (AP) — Speaker John Boehner defended his decision to push a bipartisan budget deal through the House as his final act before leaving Congress after nearly a quarter-century.
“It’s a solid agreement and I’m proud of it,” Boehner told a group of reporters Wednesday in his office shortly before the House began to vote on the deal that raise the debt limit through 2017 and sets spending levels for two years, taking both those thorny issues off the table for Speaker-nominee Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI). “It was something that in my view had to be done. I didn’t think leaving this for the next speaker was at all fair.”
Boehner said he’s proud of the work he’s done as a member of Congress from Ohio’s 8th District, and as speaker of the U.S. House and second in line to the presidency for nearly five years. He said he’s having no second thoughts about his decision to resign under conservative pressure, leaving Congress before the end of his term.
Indeed he said he was starting to get concerned in recent weeks after Majority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) abruptly dropped out of the race to replace him and some lawmakers started talking about drafting him to remain in office. He said around 50 members were planning to march over to his office to demand that he stay and promise to vote for no one else — and even release a letter saying as much.
“That would’ve been a real nightmare,” a relaxed and jacketless Boehner remarked, smoking a Camel. One of his lieutenants talked the band down, he added.
But Ryan agreed to pressure from him and others to run, and Boehner said he began to see a light at the end of the tunnel. He said that Ryan, nominated by House Republicans on Wednesday for speaker and set to be elected on the House floor Thursday, will be a good successor to carry on his work.
“He’s an innovative thinker who’s focused on giving more Americans more opportunity to achieve the American dream and I think he’s got the skill set to do this job,” Boehner said.
Boehner said he’d given Ryan lots of advice. Chief among it: “This is the loneliest place in the world,” Boehner said. “Almost as lonely as the presidency.”
The speaker serves alone, away from friends and family, Boehner said, forced to make tough decisions that can come back on him alone.
Boehner’s biggest regret, he said, was not finalizing a major budget deal with President Barack Obama in 2011 that would have overhauled the tax code, curbed the explosive growth of entitlement programs and put the country on a significantly sounder fiscal footing.
That failure “still stings,” said Boehner. As for why it was tough to work with the president? Boehner said he’d save his reflections on that for a book.
Boehner said he didn’t know what, if anything, he could have done anything differently to deal with the House Freedom Caucus, the group of hard-line conservatives who pushed him toward the exit by threatening a floor vote on his speakership after complaining of his penchant for compromise.
He attributed polarization in the House to the 24-hour news cycle and ascendancy of talk radio and incessant political chatter on cable networks.
The 65-year-old has worked every day of his life since he had a paper route at age 8, and claimed to have no idea what he’ll do next. Golf and time with his new grandchild — who he joked will address him as “Mr. Speaker” — will play a big part.
“It’s been a good run,” Boehner said.
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