{mosads}The conservative Florida Political Press website first reported the comment, made at a Tea Party forum for three Senate candidates in Orlando last Saturday.
The plan, proposed by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), would cut about $5 trillion and would create a “premium support” option to help future Medicare recipients obtain private insurance.
Mack voted for Ryan’s budget in 2011, although the 2012 plan made some changes, particularly to the Medicare component of the budget.
Mack spokesman David James said Mack meant to criticize the vote itself and the fact that the bill will likely stall after leaving the House.
“The vote was the ‘joke,’ as in the process being a joke, not the Ryan plan itself,” he told the Miami Herald. “He supports the Ryan plan but the process is a joke when the GOP House continues to do the right things and the liberal Senate under [Majority Leader Harry] Reid (D-Nev.) and [Sen. Bill] Nelson (R-Fla.) continue to kill fiscally responsible measures.”
Mack is running against Nelson for his seat in the Senate. Nelson’s office did not respond immediately when asked to comment.
Mack is not the only Republican to criticize the budget proposal, which is waiting for Senate action and unlikely to earn enough support to pass the upper chamber. Rick Santorum said last week the plan didn’t include enough spending cuts.
Many Republicans have expressed frustration with their party for not calling for more drastic action, while leaders have sought a workable deal over the past year of budget tension in Congress. Ten Republicans voted against the bill, which ultimately passed 235-193. Rep. Tim Huelskamp (Kansas), one of the House Republicans who voted against the bill, said it lacked “a real path to tax reform.”
House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) defended the bill as an attempt “to lay out a real vision of what we were to do if we get more control here in this town.”
Josh Lederman contributed.