News

Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Marco Rubio today issued the following web video statement on President Obama’s debt speech this afternoon:

“For almost 100 years, America has been the world’s economic leader. Our people have invented more things, started more businesses and created more jobs than any other nation in history. But now, every day, we get closer and closer to losing what it took generations of Americans to build.

“Americans are as ready as ever to create jobs, start businesses and invent new industries. But we are on the verge of losing our economic and global credibility because, for far too long, Washington politicians in both parties, have been borrowing and spending money we don’t have.

“Today, Americans are working harder but making less. They are finding it harder to start a business or land a job. And our government is not helping. In fact, it is making things worse. Making it worse by threatening to raise our taxes, making it worse by continuing to spend money we don’t have, and making it all worse because they seem unwilling or unable to come up with a real plan to deal with all this.

“The rest of the world is looking at all this and is starting to believe that we’re not serious about getting our act together.

“Today’s speech by the President on this issue is a welcome development. But with all due respect, some of his ideas would take us in the wrong direction.

“As we prepare to have a debate on our economy in general and our debt in specific, we should be guided by three key principles.

“First, we have to create jobs. We have to grow our economy. We cannot do anything that would scare job creators and keep them from creating jobs.

“Second, we need to takes steps now to save Medicare and invest in our national security. Those like my 80-year-old mom cannot afford cuts to their benefits, but those in my generation must take steps now if we want Medicare to even exist when we retire. And the world is as dangerous as ever. But it is a safer and better world when America is the strongest military power in the world.

“And third, we must undertake reforms that show we are serious about solving our dangerous debt problem. We have to start solving this problem now. We cannot afford to wait another year or for another election. To just raise the debt limit, without any serious efforts to solve the debt problem would be catastrophic.

“America is still the greatest country in the world. But it won’t be for much longer if we don’t solve the debt problem we have. And we are running out of time to act.

“In a few weeks, we will reach our $14.2 trillion legal limit for borrowing money, and the President is going to call on Congress to raise this so-called debt limit. This is the perfect opportunity to talk about our debt problem and to start solving it.”