Romney Campaign Press Release - Mitt Romney: I WIll Balance the Budget and Get the Economy Back on Track

"I'm planning on getting a balanced budget and, at the same time, getting this economy going again. This is a classic pitting of two very different philosophies. Do you believe in lower taxes and lower marginal rates and smaller government? That's what I believe in. Or do you believe in higher taxes like the President is proposing and more government spending and larger deficits. That's what President Obama stands for. That's a failed policy. We know where that leads." — Mitt Romney

"Fox News Sunday"

Fox

February 26, 2012

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Mitt Romney On Fox News Sunday:

CHRIS WALLACE: "But just to make it clear Governor, you're saying then that despite the killing, and in some cases inside-job, killing of American soldiers, you would continue your commitment to winning the war in Afghanistan?"

MITT ROMNEY: "Well, what we want to do is to transition Afghanistan such that its own military and its own security forces can maintain the sovereignty of their government from an attack from the Taliban. We do not want to see Afghanistan once again return to a Taliban dominated nation with al-Qaeda and other training camps coming into the nation. That is a mission which is continuing and based upon what we are seeing so far, we haven't been as successful as we could have been.  And I think one of the reasons for that is the President did not ensure that the elections were fair and open, with a credible candidate being selected. The President also announced a withdrawal date—a time certain which I think made it very clear to the Taliban they just had to wait us out. I think the President's some made enormous mistakes in the conduct of the mission there."

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MITT ROMNEY: "I want to make sure we maintain the progressivity in the code, and I want to help people who I think have been most hurt by the Obama economy, and that's middle-income Americans. I'm not looking to change the deal that we have right now with regards to people looking at their share of the tax burden, but what I am looking to do is to lower the marginal rate for all Americans across the board. And by doing that, I'm sure you understand this, about 55 percent of America's workers work in businesses that are not classic corporations, they're instead taxed at the individual rate. I want to get these rates down so we can get American workers back into jobs again. This is a pro-growth policy, that's why the Wall Street Journal liked it, wrote a very positive editorial about it. That's why I think people look at President Obama's plan, which is calling on raising the marginal rate, that'll kill jobs and make it harder for our economy to reboot. So whatever choice of language I have to use, I want to make sure and get across to the American people I'm cutting rates across the board by 20 percent and I'm not going to put a bigger burden on middle-income Americans."

CHRIS WALLACE: "All right, now let's take the argument from the left, and they say that if your plan, as you and your advisers claim is revenue neutral, which means that all of these taxes when you cut the rates and eliminate some deductions, isn't going to raise or lower the deficit, that you get your deficit reduction through spending cuts. $500 billion you claim in 2016, and they say that ends up being about a 40 percent cut in domestic programs, which means major cuts in the programs that the poor depend on the most."

ROMNEY: "Well, you I'm sure you understand, the tax plan that I've described is very much consistent with the tax plan that the President's own bipartisan commission came up with. The Bowles-Simpson Commission laid out a plan which is very similar to mine. What's astonishing, I think, to a lot of people in the country, is that President Obama just abandoned his own tax commission..."

WALLACE: "But he took a trillion... If I may sir, he took a trillion dollars of that money and used it for deficit reduction, you don't. ... Bowles Simpson did."

ROMNEY: "Yeah, what I'd do is I'd take... I'd get this tax rate, take the marginal rate down to encourage economic growth, which it will do. Put more people back to work, get more tax revenue by virtue of that. I also broaden the base, which means for certain individuals, high income individuals, we're going to limit the deductions and the exemptions. And then I'd go through and reduce the rate of growth of benefits for high-income people in Medicare and Social Security, that's for folks down the road, by the way, not for current retirees. And then I'd also eliminate a lot of programs, federal programs, and take a lot of poverty programs and send them back to the states where I think they can be managed far more efficiently. But let me tell you, if this is an argument about President Obama saying hey, look, don't cut back on federal spending, keep on growing this deficit, I think that's a battle I'm going to win because I am planning on cutting the deficit down to zero. I'm planning on getting a balanced budget and, at the same time, getting this economy going again. This is a classic pitting of two very different philosophies. Do you believe in lower taxes and lower marginal rates and smaller government? That's what I believe in. Or do you believe in higher taxes like the President is proposing and more government spending and larger deficits. That's what President Obama stands for. That's a failed policy. We know where that leads."