Tea party leader: Government shutdown is the wrong move (video)

Tea Party Express chairman Amy Kremer argued against a government shutdown as members of Congress try to reach agreement on a federal budget for the final six months of the fiscal year.

The 87 new members of the House Republican caucus are split on whether to accept a budget measure that cuts government spending by less than the $61 billion that the Republicans approved in February. Some who are aligned with the tea party movement are calling for a partial government shutdown rather than agree to something closer to the $33 billion in budget cuts being offered by Democrats.

At a Monitor-sponsored breakfast for reporters on Tuesday, Ms. Kremer said a shutdown is not the right path. “I don’t think it is a good thing to shut down our government. But I do think they need to do what they said they were going to do. They [Republican members of Congress] said they were going to cut $100 billion” in federal spending, she said. The $100 billion reduction target was for the fiscal year that ends Sept. 30.

Later in her comments, Kremer added another cautionary note about a shutdown saying, “But shutting down our government, defaulting on our debt – interest rates will go up, that sort of thing. I don’t think that is the right thing to do.”