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Roskam: 'The Sequester is the President's Sequester'

'We've got to have our heads in the game, hold this president's feet to the fire as it relates to spending'

February 5, 2013

In light of the approaching sequester deadline, Rep. Peter Roskam (R., Ill.) insisted Tuesday on CNBC that taxes would not go up again under House Republicans and scolded President Obama for creating an impression that tax hikes he pushed for in December would end the country's fiscal problems.

"This is President Obama's sequester," he said. "The president in December had a great deal to say about all these revenues that were coming in, and he created the impression on the part of the American public that all of our fiscal problems were going to go away. It was all going to be great if simply those tax rates went up. Well, the tax rates went up, the president now has $600 billion in new revenue. So this notion that somehow the remedy is to go back to the taxpayers and increase taxes is a complete nonstarter."

Roskam told host Larry Kudlow that Obama's logic on spending was an absurdity and a march toward a debt crisis.

"We've got to have our heads in the game, hold this president's feet to the fire as it relates to spending and make sure that he's following through on the spending discipline that he celebrates," Roskam said.