Mr. Pence: It is not widely known, I don't think, but John Boehner and I actually have not only adjacent seats at this meeting, but we have adjacent congressional districts, separated only by the Indiana Ohio border. So he is very aware that the best popcorn in America is grown in Indiana.

Mr. Boehner: We grow a lot of it in my district as well, in case you are interested.

Mr. Pence: Questions will follow. Let me share a couple of thoughts and then I will yield to the leader. And thank you all for your time.

We embarked last night on a momentous debate about the future of this economy. These are very serious times in the life of our Nation. Republicans acknowledge that we are in a serious economic downturn. The recession is real. American families are hurting. Many have lost their jobs, many millions more are afraid that they are going to be next. So we take this time very, very seriously. That being said, it is a disappointment to Republicans, and I expect it is a disappointment to millions of Americans that Democrats have brought to the floor a purely partisan bill that does not reflect either in content or tone the bipartisan challenge that President Obama reiterated in meeting with Republicans in the House yesterday.

As we told the President, the American people deserve to know, the President's call for compromise has been completely ignored by House Democrats who have used this time of national crisis to fund their own big government priorities under the guise of stimulating the economy. House Republicans take President Obama at his word. When he said he wanted to bring together all sides in the Congress, bring the best ideas to bear on confronting this time of economic crisis. But the Democrats' promises change in bipartisanship ring hollow in the face of a bill that does little more than fund a wish list of long‑standing liberal spending priorities.

Republicans ask, you know, what this $50 million to the National Endowment For the Arts have to do with creating jobs? You know what does hundreds of millions of dollars in climate research have to do with putting Americans back to work? The Democratic bill won't stimulate anything but more government and more debt. And we very respectfully delivered that message to the President yesterday and reiterated our profound interest in bringing forward Republican proposals for tax relief for working families, small businesses and family farms in this equation. Not because we are against a Democrat bill for Democrats spending. It is because we do not believe that what the Democrats have brought to the floor today will work.

The time‑honored method for Washington, D.C. to promote and encourage economic growth is to reduce taxes on small businesses and working families, and then allow Americans to invest in ways that will create opportunities for our Nation. So it is a very serious debate. We take it very seriously, and we have been busy under John Boehner's leadership of making his case to the American people. And with that, I will yield to the leader.

Mr. Boehner: Thanks, Mike. As Mike said, House Republicans want to work with President Obama to refocus this bill on immediate job creation and tax relief. The bill that we have on the floor today just doesn't cut it. And the bill is supposed to be about jobs, preserving jobs and creating new jobs. And when you look at much of the spending in this bill, it doesn't meet that test.

So today, we are going to offer an alternative rooted in our principles that fast‑acting tax relief rather than slow‑moving government spending will, in fact, create more jobs. Included in here will be tax relief for American families where we cut the 15 percent rate to 10, the 10 percent rate to 5. All Americans who pay income taxes will see tax relief up to $3,200 per family. We will have provisions that will encourage small businesses to invest more in new equipment and hire new employees, and the taxation on unemployment benefits to help job seekers, assist home buyers and most importantly, we have no tax increases in our proposal.

But at the end of the day, we are going to need the President's help intervening with Democrats here on the Hill to get serious changes in this bill to meet our shared objectives, create jobs and preserve jobs in America. I know the President said yesterday that he was hopeful to our ideas on tax relief for American families and small businesses. He even said that there is some provisions in this bill, spending provisions that he didn't like. And so I expect that most House Republicans will oppose this bill today, and hope that when we get to conference with our colleagues in the Senate, that we can have a bill worthy of our support.

Mr. Pence. Questions. And as we said last week, it is always helpful if you share your first name and who you are with.

Q (CQ): Do you think if the bill is approved, is there time between now and the 2010 election for it to be revealed as a failure that you might gain some benefit out of it if it is a failure?

Mr. Boehner: I don't know that we will know what the final bill is going to look like. It is way too early to prejudge what the end product will look like.

Mr. Pence: Can I challenge a premise of your question about political advantage? I am going to tell you, we just came from the leadership meeting. And as we talk to Members, this really ‑‑ this is about doing what is going to work to put this economy back on track. And I can tell you, this is not about political posturing among Republicans. We are steadfastly committed to the Republican alternatives that we have been developing over the past few weeks because we believe that is what is necessary to get this economy moving again.

Q (Lisa from CNN radio): Can you talk about some of the specific items that we have heard so much about, the National Mall for one. It looks like Democrats may be backing down on that, and what you think about that signal from Democrats if, in fact, that does come out of the bill, and also HIV and sexually transmitted disease prevention, money that is in there. Can you hit on those two? And whichever ones you guys want to highlight, too.

Mr. Boehner: Well, it looks as though they are going to take the money out to fix up the National Mall, and that they are going to take out the family planning funds that are in the bill. Two steps in the right direction. But there are still hundreds of billions of dollars of other wasteful spending in the bill. You know I don't know why we need to give NASA $400 million to study climate change, nor do I understand why we need $650 million to buy digital TV coupons. And the list goes on and on and on.

Remember, they wanted to be focused like a laser on creating jobs and preventing job losses. That is the test? Because at the end of the day, America needs this bill to work, and that is where our focus has been. That is where our conversations with the President have been and that is where they will continue to be.

Q: Mr. Leader, Molly from the Hill.

Mr. Boehner: Thank you.

Q: Just in case. Just in case. You know, I am wondering, does the Republican alternative include funds for infrastructure transportation spending?

Mr. Boehner: The substitute will not. But I would suspect our motion to recommit will.

Q: Okay. And what do you think the motion to recommit will look like? How much will it cost? Will it go to ‑‑

Mr. Boehner: You will see it later.

Mr. Pence: Maureen.

Q: Maureen from Gannett News Service. The conference has criticized the money in the bill for higher education saying that a lot of universities colleges had million dollar endowments. Do you think then that there should be no money in the stimulus at all for colleges and universities?

Mr. Boehner: There are a number of provisions in there. One that is of concern is the additional Pell Grant money that is in the bill. Because what is going to happen here is there is this big increase in Pell. And so what do we do next year? Now they say they are committed to the cliff, that the amount is going to drop. I have got real doubts as to whether politically that will ever happen. And so what they are putting in place is something that is going to cost hundreds of billions of dollars over the next 10 years, the way they have constructed it. And then some of the other funds in there are just a handout to colleges and universities for infrastructure that I just don't ‑‑ I don't think it meets the test of timely, targeted and temporary.

Mr. Pence: I think, if I can speak to that, because you mentioned a university in my district. You know, we have got a budget process, an appropriations process ahead of us this year. There is ample time to debate various types of programmatic spending. What the American people are expecting Congress to do in a stimulus bill is to invest the kind of resources and the kind of methods that will get this economy moving again. And when you start to see $136 billion in new program spending, when you see some analysis published this morning in The Wall Street Journal that suggests 12 cents out of every dollar in this bill could even be described as stimulus, then I think the reason why you see many millions of Americans beginning to take a different look at what House Democrats have done here is because they are starting to understand that this is just a massive wish list of kind of dusty old liberal spending priorities that have been brought forward under the guise of stimulus.

I would cite ‑‑ and the last comment would be, none other than The Washington Post's analysis in their editorial this Sunday saying this appears to be an effort to reorganize Federal spending priorities. Well that is not what the American people are expecting Congress to do. They are expecting to do what the leader suggested and that is timely, targeted, focused investment of resources that will get the economy moving again.

Mr. Boehner: Nice hair, by the way. You got a new product or what?

Q: Thank you very much, Mr. Leader. Spent a lot of time on that this morning.

Mr. Boehner: Do you need a brush? You will probably break one.

Q: My hair is frozen, Mr. Leader.

Mr. Boehner: Just in case anybody thought I might have changed since the last time we had a pen and pad.

Mr. Pence: Nobody thought that.

Mr. Boehner: I am sorry. Yes.

Q: Steve Dennis from Roll Call. You said your positions aren't about politics. But aren't your Members going to be to be taking a risk voting against the biggest tax cut in years, a whole bunch of programs that would bring money back to their districts, back to their States? Peter King said yesterday, it means $9 to $11 billion just for the Medicaid portion for New York. Aren't Members being asked to sort of walk up a difficult road here against something that is going to bring a lot of money back to their districts, back to their States, back to their schools?

Mr. Boehner: I think Members are concerned about the wasteful spending that is in the bill, the spending that won't create jobs or won't strengthen the safety net. And it wasn't like there has been some big whip operation to whip Members up against the bill. It just didn't happen. Members have looked at this over the last week and have determined that it just doesn't meet the test.

Q: Rich Cohen, National Journal. Does the fact that several Republicans in the Senate Appropriations Committee voted for the bill to some extent pull the rug out from underneath House Republicans?
Mr. Boehner: No. We are on this side of the Great Wall of China. You know, most House Members, they are going to do what they are going to do. They are not influenced by what people on the other side of the Capitol do.

Q: ‑‑ allow Democrats and Obama to have to deal with Senate Republicans?

Mr. Boehner: Oh, we will see. I am not going to prejudge what is going to happen here over the next couple of weeks, although it should be interesting.

Mr. Pence: I think that ‑‑ there is two ways of looking at the way this building works. And that is, one is that you just count individuals in the 535 people who are here. And last time I checked, they had enough votes to pass the bill. And judging from some of the signals we are getting at the other end of the building, they may have enough to deal with an issue of cloture.

But there is another person at the table, and that is the American people. And I believe that while there is risk in this for Members politically, I believe the American people in the last week have started to take a hard look at what the Democrat stimulus bill really is. And the American people know we can do better. And House Republicans are going to continue to fight for better solutions to get this economy moving.

Q: Can I follow up ‑‑ Rich Wolf, USA Today. You were talking about Pell Grants. What else concerns you about the Democratic bill in terms of spending that continues beyond the 18 months? And wouldn't the same thing occur in your substitute? Are you going to lower taxes to 10 percent, et cetera, and then pull the rug out 2 years later?

Mr. Boehner: I think the relief in our bill will be permanent. But if you look at the IDEA money that they are pushing out in this bill, the Title I money, how are they going to sustain that level of spending? And I said before, White House staff said well, no, we are committed to the fact there is going to be a cliff in that spending. It is just not how this town works. And so when you look at the Pell numbers, the IDEA numbers, the Title I numbers and those big increases, they are going to end up having to be sustained for years and years to come.

Q: How are you going to keep everything in your bill? Are you going to move forward beyond the stimulus period or are you not?

Mr. Boehner: I think that we have got the numbers for our bill are 10‑year numbers in our substitute. And it is clearly far less than spending in our substitute than in their bill.

Q: But it would still add to the debt, your bill.

Mr. Boehner: It would add to the debt, but only around half as much as the Democrat proposal.

Mr. Pence: And if I may, Leader, I know part of the religion in Washington, D.C. is something called static analysis, okay. But can I just speak up on behalf of the American people? I resent when people talk about tax cuts costing the government money. I know that is how we think about it out here. That is not how people in Columbus Indiana think about it. They think it is their money.

They want to keep it and not send it here in the first place. And the issue of the long‑term indebtedness, deficits, the national debt, restructuring entitlements, those are important issues and we will continue. But this is really about right now, how do you bring immediate relief and jolt this economy back to life? And we know and history teaches tax relief for working families and small businesses in significant measures is the fastest and most effective way to recover.

Q: Mr. Leader, Jeff, Al Jazeera. Question, just a broader question, just looking at the stark numbers of votes. And let's just say for sake of argument the substitute does not pass ‑‑

Mr. Boehner: That is a fair predicate.

Q: That is a fair predicate. What compromise gets House Republicans to the table?

Mr. Boehner: Well, as I said before, I don't think the bill that we are considering today meets President Obama's test of preserving jobs and creating new jobs, nor does this bill meet his test of changing the way Washington works. You know, they have got a partisan bill, and yet, for some reason, they expect bipartisan support. And if they want to have bipartisan support at the end of the day, we are going to have to have, you know, a bipartisan bill. But there is a lot of water going to flow over the dam over the next 2 weeks, and it will be interesting to see how this bill changes.

Mr. Pence: How about one last question. Back here who hasn't asked yet. I am not running off but I am sensitive to the leader's time.

Q: Jonathan from CPNA. One and a half questions. A, would AMT be considered ‑‑ and b, is this whole ‑‑ you talked a lot about old liberal, dusty liberal programs but the counterargument seemed to be there were 2001, 2003, 2006 and ‑‑ stimulus guide of tax cuts that haven't stimulated the economy. So why would these tax proposals be more effective than previous ones?

Mr. Boehner: Well, listen, the tax reductions in 2001 and 2003 prevented our economy from slipping into a deep recession, and they worked. They helped create jobs. They helped preserve jobs. I don't think there is any question about that. And frankly, they also helped bring additional revenue into the Treasury as the economy expanded and, you know, some 5 million new jobs were created from, you know, between 2002 and 2007, and so they worked. When we start talking about cutting tax rates, everybody assumes that means less revenue to the Federal Government.
And if you look back over the last 27 years, it does in the first year, maybe in the first year and a half. But almost all of these tax rate reductions helped expand the economy, create more employment and at the end of the day, more revenue to the Federal Government. This experiment has been going on since 1981 when President Reagan had a bipartisan bill, moved through the House and Senate, signed it into law that cut the top tax rate from 70 percent to 28 percent. Most of you who didn't have the luxury of paying 70 cents of every additional dollar of your income to the Federal Government.
In 1978, this is when I knew I was a Republican because I grew up as a Democrat. In 1978, I made more ‑‑ no. 1978 I paid more in taxes than I made gross in 1976. And I paid some of my income in 1978 ‑‑ I paid some of my taxes at 70 percent. Imagine that. I mean, nobody could imagine this today that you would do this. And so there is some point of diminishing returns where lower tax rates don't produce more employment, don't produce more income. But I don't think we are at the point of diminishing returns.

Q: AMT?

Mr. Boehner: I don't know that it is going to stimulate the economy, but we need to get AMT fixed once and for all.

Mr. Pence: Let me say before the leader exits a quick heads up to everyone, Republicans will be departing tomorrow, assuming the legislative schedule goes on schedule. We will be departing for our retreat. We have a record attendance. And for those of you that can participate, there will be unprecedented media access to Speakers and Members that are there if you are making a plan for the trip. And let me say, someone said on Politico this morning that Republicans have found their voice. I thought something the leader said spontaneously is actually very, very true. It would be accurate that there has not been a whip effort on this bill of any great extent. What you have seen is what was speculated today, I think Republicans under John's leadership are finding their voice and getting in the fight. We are going to step up for the American taxpayer and for the kind of legislation that is really going to put America back to work. And we believe bringing our principles to bear on that will be the most effective means of accomplishing that.

Mr. Boehner: Mike, thank you for inviting me back to come and visit all of my friends.

Mr. Pence: Thank you. We will do it again.