Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., took to the airwaves to fight back at President Obama’s sharp attack on the Republican budget plan he drafted that has become a rallying point for the GOP.
“What's wild about this to me, Brett [Baier], is the president's willing to be so distortive of the truth, so misleading to the American people. Quite honestly, I think it's sort of beneath the office of the presidency to make such claims like that,” Ryan told Fox News on Tuesday night.
Paul was responding to Obama’s speech to the Associated Press Annual Luncheon in which the president called the Ryan plan a “Trojan horse” and “thinly veiled social Darwinism.” Obama’s attacks were considered another salvo in his already-begun general election battle against Mitt Romney.
“The president hasn't offered solutions. He's waiting for Republicans to offer their solutions, then he's distorting their budget in order to try and mislead the country. What I think he's trying to do is divide us in order to distract us as his election strategy,” Ryan said.
Ryan is mentioned as a potential vice presidential pick for Romney, and the two campaigned together in Wisconsin before Romney’s win there on Tuesday night.
“I think the president is getting dispirited. I think he's getting more partisan. We're kind of used to this, unfortunately," he told Fox. "I think people want to be talked to like adults, they want honest solutions. And I just don't think they're going to buy this kind of lying.”
Asked if he was accusing the president of lying, Ryan said Obama’s comments were “distorting the truth,” but that he’d “leave it at that.”
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