Cuellar: Dems Should ‘Definitely’ ‘Be Open to’ Across the Board Cuts Tied to Debt Ceiling

On Wednesday’s broadcast of Bloomberg’s “Balance of Power,” Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) stated that Democrats should “Definitely” be open to spending cuts across the board, even if it’s directly tied to the debt ceiling, and “it would be good for us to sit down and see if we can reach some sort of negotiation.”

Cuellar said, “The first step to address this issue is to sit down and talk. So, that’s the number one thing that they’re going to do today. They’re going to feel — see where everybody’s at and see how far they can go. Using the debt ceiling — and we saw this back in 2011 when the Republicans took over, they used the debt ceiling as leverage. And you’ve got to be careful with that. I can understand how they’re using that as leverage, but you’ve to be careful that we don’t get downgraded like we did in 2011, because people are pushing this too much to the brink. Everybody knows that we do not want to default. The question is, how far will this be pushed before everybody says, okay, let’s go ahead and raise the debt ceiling?”

Host David Westin then asked, “But should Democrats be open at least to having some discussion about limiting spending, whether it’s directly tied or not, whether it’s in parallel, should they be open to some way of limiting spending? And I mean across the board, not just the social programs or maybe even defense.”

Cuellar responded, “Definitely. I think we should be open to that possibility. I always smile because I looked at the debt that presidents have added, Democrats and Republicans, and it’s interesting that you look at what President Obama added…in eight years, then you look at what President Trump did in four years. One was about $9 billion. Trump was at $7 billion in four years. So, it’s something that I think we need to sit down and talk about it. But we’ve got to be careful we don’t just blame one side or the other. But I think it would be good for us to sit down and see if we can reach some sort of negotiation.”

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