Senate Republican: House GOP budget ‘serious’ and ‘honest’

Ryan’s budget would cut spending by close to $6 trillion over a decade, but would take longer to balance the federal budget. 

The Alabama Republican also called on Senate Democrats to present a budget of their own, saying that he had not been told by Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.), the Senate Budget chairman, when to expect a proposal. 

Speaking to reporters after the availability, Sessions added that Senate Republicans might offer a complete substitute to whatever budget their Democratic counterparts eventually offer – but would not say how close his ideas would be to Ryan’s.

“It’s really in the hands of the majority,” Sessions said. “They have the majority. They have the responsibility, as we all know around here, to move a budget.”

Democrats like Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) have slammed the Ryan budget for its alterations to Medicare – an attack echoed Tuesday afternoon by Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.).

“To give away a huge tax break to wealthy Americans and then turn around to average working-class Americans and say, ‘Medicare isn’t going to be there for you’ is not something that the country is going to swallow,” Murray said.