Montana Congressman Steve Daines stated on Tuesday, October 8, that he does not, in the short term, see a path forward in the effort to find any common ground in the political fight between Republicans in the House and President Obama.

"We had our morning meeting with Speaker Boehner and the Republican conference this morning where we huddled for about an hour," Daines said. "The President called Speaker Boehner this morning and said 'John, I'm not negotiating on the debt ceiling.' Now, it is unprecedented that the President refuses to negotiate.This isn't the first time we've been at this point. During the last debt limit debate, the President came to the table and that was in August of 2011 when we passed that $1.2 trillion dollar budget control act."

Harry Reid
Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images
loading...

Daines said both the President and Senator Harry Reid have said they flatly refuse to negotiate over either a request to modify the Affordable Care Act, or the debt ceiling.

"Harry Reid says we will not negotiate and the President says we will not negotiate, so how do you work that out in a business setting?" Daines asked. "We have to find a way to sort this out. I honestly in the short term, do not see a path forward, until the parties come to the table and talk. It's going to be difficult to resolve this."

Daines said he believes that Congress is ready to stand united on two important issues.

"I think that there's a very unified Congress right now," Daines said. "Unified to deal with two things. One, that we have fairness on Obamacare, in that the President has cut special deals with big business and with government workers, but not with everyday citizens. Second, we need to look at our long-term spending and find ways to bend that spending curve downward. We're going to be at $16.7 billion dollars of debt on October 17th. If we project out further, we're going to be up to $20 trillion dollars, and interest rates will have to rise dramatically just to service the debt."

Daines said at some point, America needs to stop kicking the debt can down the road.

"Critics are always accusing Congress saying that you guys keep kicking the can down the road," Daines said. "Well, we want to stop kicking the can, we want the President to come to the table and negotiate. If we're going to raise the debt ceiling, what are we going to do here to reduce spending? Because we don't want to have to face this debt ceiling crisis over and over again."

Montana Congressman Steve Daines

 

More From Newstalk KGVO 1290 AM & 98.3 FM