Obama blasts Congress on sequester

NEWPORT NEWS, Va. – President Barack Obama used a backdrop of a shipbuilding plant, factory workers and the local Republican congressman in his latest attempt to increase pressure on Congress to bend on the sequester cuts.

With Rep. Scott Rigell (R-Va.) in tow but off stage — even as the congressman said later that president and the GOP deserve equal blame for not advancing viable sequester alternatives — Obama warned that while the nation won’t see immediate damages should the sequester cuts take place Friday, they will damage the economic recovery he has carefully shepherded and place the nation’s security at risk.


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“These cuts are wrong,” he said while standing in front of a three-story aircraft carrier propeller. “They’re not smart, they’re not fair, they are a self-inflicted wound that doesn’t have to happen.”

Rigell provided the White House with the bipartisan display it’s long sought, and Obama said he gave the congressman from Virginia Beach “credit” deserved for breaking with his leadership and traveling here aboard Air Force One.

Obama acknowledged the political risk for Republicans — “That’s not always healthy, being with me,” he said — but praised Rigell for his call for Republicans to consider new tax revenues as part of a deal to avert the sequester.

“There are too many Republicans in Congress right now who refuse to compromise even an inch when it comes to closing tax loopholes and special interest tax breaks,” Obama said. “Keep in mind, nobody is asking them to raise income tax rates. All we’re asking is for them to consider closing tax loopholes and deductions.”

Rigell did not speak at the event, though he did with reporters aboard Air Force One, expressing his dissatisfaction with his conference but his skepticism that any deal could be struck ahead of the March 1 deadline. Along with Rigell, Obama praised by name Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and made a reference to “your Republican governor,” Bob McDonnell, for promoting Obama’s version of a “balanced approach.”

Neither attended the event.

As has his administration, Obama warned the sequester would result in delays in commercial air traffic, fewer federal crimes being investigated and prosecuted, less child care and a building slowdown for defense contractors.

The president said Defense employees would face unpaid furloughs, the ripple effects of which would be damaging to local and national economies.

Obama also delivered a rebuke to Republicans who have said in recent weeks that the White House should be forced to choose what elements of the government are cut due to sequester.

The cuts themselves, he said, are too broad to be able to be targeted toward specific agencies or programs. Instead, Obama said, more tax revenue is necessary to meet the sequester’s debt-reduction target.

“There’s no smart way to do it,” he said. “Do I close funding for disabled kids or poor kids? Do I close this Navy shipyard or some other? When you’re doing things in a way that’s not smart, you can’t gloss over the pain and impact it’s going to have on the economy. The broader point is, Virginia, we can’t just cut our way to prosperity.”

Rigell is hardly anyone’s idea of a rock-ribbed Republican. The former car dealer gave $1,000 to Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign and told a town hall meeting Monday that House Speaker John Boehner was not acting in the country’s best interest. Obama won his district in November.

Rigell, the first Republican congressman to fly on Air Force One with Obama since Sen. Rand Paul traveled to Kentucky in Sept. 2011, told reporters Tuesday before the event that there isn’t time to negotiate and pass a sequestration agreement before Friday’s deadline.

“I don’t believe that there’s enough time to come to a definitive agreement which would stop it,” he said

Rigell, whose district is among the most military-heavy in the country, said after the event that he was disappointed that Obama didn’t present specifics of how he would prefer to reduce federal government spending in place of the sequester.

“I appreciate him bringing attention to this matter,” Rigell told POLITICO after returning to Washington. “What I did not see, the same thing I told him on Air Force One, I did not see a definitive outline of the expense reductions that would be expressed in the form of legislation. I don’t know to what extent he’s encouraging Sen. (Harry) Reid to advance such a bill. If one isn’t advanced through the Senate, we won’t have one to advance through the House.”

Rigell said he’s already heard from GOP colleagues expressing puzzlement that he would join Obama on Tuesday’s trip, but that he could not in good conscience have passed on a chance to make the case for his constituents to the president.

“I wasn’t going there to be an apologist or an advocate for the president, i was going there to try to persuade people,” Rigell said. “I was trying to make a point to the president, even though there’s downside with people in my own conference not undersanding or questioning my motives.”

Rigell said he and Obama did not speak during the return flight to Washington.

Obama, who won a second term in 2012 with only two fewer states than he took during his first election in 2008, said his time in office has taught him humility and that he cannot accomplish his agenda alone.

“The one thing about being president is after four years you become pretty humble,” Obama said. “You think that maybe you wouldn’t but actually you do, when you realize you cant do things by yourself, that’s not how our system works. You’ve got to have the help and the goodwill of Congress. And what that means is you have to make sure the constituents of the members of Congress are putting some pressure and making sure they’re doing the right thing, putting an end to some of these political games.”