Political positions of Paul Ryan
During the economic recovery from the Great Recession of the late 2000s, Ryan supported the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), which authorized the Treasury to purchase toxic assets from banks and other financial institutions, and the auto industry bailout; Ryan opposed the Credit CARD Act of 2009, which expanded consumer protections regarding credit card plans, and the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, which strengthened financial regulation.
Ryan supported the Medicare Part D prescription drug benefit and opposes the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as "Obamacare."
Asked on June 19, 2016, on Meet the Press about his support for Donald Trump, Ryan said "The last thing I want to see happen is another Democrat in the White House."
[citation needed] On January 27, 2010, the day of President Barack Obama's State of the Union address, Ryan reintroduced a modified version of his Roadmap, H.R.
[30] Economist and columnist Paul Krugman criticized Ryan's plan as making overly optimistic assumptions and proposing tax cuts for the wealthy.
[31] Krugman also called the plan a "fraud" saying it relied on severe cuts in domestic discretionary spending and "dismantling Medicare as we know it" by suggesting the voucher system, which he noted was similar to a failed attempt at reform in 1995.
[31] In contrast, columnist Ramesh Ponnuru, writing in the National Review, argued that Ryan's plan would lead to less debt than current budgets.
On August 31, 2010, the National Republican Congressional Committee requested members not to defend the Roadmap, noting its proposal to privatize social security.
[41][42] On an April 27, 2011, conference call with reporters Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said that passage of the Ryan plan "would be one of the worst things to happen to this country".
[36] On March 23, 2012, Ryan introduced a version of his federal budget for the fiscal year 2013, known as "The Path to Prosperity: A Blueprint for American Renewal.
[51] Parts of the 2012 Ryan budget were criticized by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops for its proposed cuts to housing and food stamp programs.
[52][53] Faculty and administrators of Georgetown University challenged what they described as Ryan's misapplication of Catholic social teaching in defending his plan.
[70] Ryan voted against the Senate compromise continuing resolution that ended the shutdown, which included raising the debt ceiling and funding for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
[80] his proposed budget for fiscal year 2015 included deep cuts to domestic spending to reduce projected federal deficits by about $5 trillion over the next decade.
[90][91][92] In 2011 President Barack Obama criticized Ryan as "not [being] on the level" by describing himself as a fiscal conservative while voting for these policies, as well as two "unpaid for" wars.
[111][112] Ryan's budget plans proposed privatizing Medicare for those under the age of 55, and funding Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program through block grants to the states.
In 2012 Ryan proposed that Medicaid be converted into block grants, but with the federal government's share of the cost cut by some $800 billion over the next decade.
[18] In 2005, Ryan and Senator John Sununu of New Hampshire introduced the Social Security Personal Savings Guarantee and Prosperity Act, also known as the Ryan-Sununu plan.
The plan would have allowed employees to direct a portion of their Federal Insurance Contributions Act payroll tax on their wages to a private account which invested in a stock portfolio managed by the Social Security Administration.
[122][123] The New York Times wrote that Ryan's vocal support of the bill dealt major damage to his standing with the public, writing "Mr. Ryan has emerged from the defeat of the health care bill [AHCA] badly damaged, retaining a job but left to confront the realities of his failure — imperiling the odd-couple partnership that was supposed to sustain a new era of conservative government under unified Republican rule.
"[128] In December 2015, Ryan led the bipartisan effort to pass the Every Student Succeeds Act, which, among other things, fully repealed No Child Left Behind and severely limited the federal government's ability to impose and enforce national education standards such as Common Core.
"[149][150][151] Ryan has voted multiple times against the House version of the Paycheck Fairness Act, which would have helped to address the gender pay gap in the United States.
"[172][173][174] Ryan supports a 10-year, $40 billion tax break for the petroleum industry, and has proposed cutting funding for renewable energy research and subsidies.
[166] Ryan opposed the Stop Online Piracy Act, stating that "it creates the precedent and possibility for undue regulation, censorship and legal abuse.
[177] On March 3, 2014, as Chairman of the Budget Committee of the House of Representatives, Ryan released a report titled The War on Poverty: 50 Years Later, asserting that some of 92 federal programs designed to help lower-income Americans have not provided the relief intended and that there is little evidence that these efforts have been successful.
[179] At the core of the report are recommendations to enact cuts to welfare, child care, college Pell grants and several other federal assistance programs.
"[178][180] According to an article in the Fiscal Times, several economists and social scientists whose work had been referenced in the report said that Ryan either misunderstood or misrepresented their research.
"[182] He made the comment during a radio interview with Bill Bennett and initiated it by citing Charles Murray, someone who is famous for propagating claims of black intellectual inferiority compared to other peoples.
[188] Daniel Larison of The American Conservative wrote that Ryan "seems to conceive of U.S. power abroad mostly in terms of military strength" and "truly is a product of the era of George W.
[196] His comments led defense industry leaders to pin their final hopes on the chance that Congress would at least allow the Pentagon to direct the coming cuts.
