McCarthy, who sat onstage behind the president throughout the address alongside Vice President Kamala Harris, described a highly partisan speech aimed at fomenting frustration on the part of GOP lawmakers in the audience, some of whom reacted with catcalls and cries of “liar” to those remarks concerning what Biden said are Republicans’ plans to sunset Social Security and Medicare.
“I thought it was one of the most partisan State of the Union speeches I’ve ever heard. It was an honor to be able to sit there, but it was like having a very good seat at a bad sporting event. I was hopeful that he would have a conversation like he and I had in the Oval Office just a week ago, but it was so partisan, and the frustration that I felt you heard from people out in the audience,” McCarthy told the Fox & Friends hosts.
“Some of my Republican friends want to take the economy hostage, I get it, unless I agree to their economic plans. All of you at home should know what those plans are. Instead of making the wealthy pay their fair share, some Republicans want Medicare and Social Security to sunset. I’m not saying it’s a majority,” Biden said.
These remarks drew loud boos and calls of “Liar!” from GOP members of the audience, prompting Biden to say that anyone who doubted the truth of these claims should contact his office.
“The president was trying to goad the members. The members are passionate about it. But the one thing the president was saying is something that he knew was not true. I just spent an hour with him, I’ve said it many times before: Social Security and Medicare are off the table,” McCarthy insisted.
“He’s trying to play politics with the debt ceiling, by not negotiating, by lying about our position. I want to be sensible. I want to sit down and work through this problem. Because, look, the Democrats raised the highest debt ceiling ever and they blew through it in the shortest amount of time, and now they want to come right back to it,” he continued.
McCarthy accused Biden of not acknowledging responsibility for the problems that working Americans contend with amid a tough economy and opioid crisis.
“Prices are up more than 13 percent, we’ve got four and a half million people [who] crossed our border illegally. He added $800 billion to the debt, and he acted like none of that transpired,” McCarthy said.
The GOP speaker said that Biden paid insufficient attention to the issue of a permeable border that facilitates the flow of fentanyl into the United States and exposes even people who do not specifically seek out opioids to grave danger.
“I think he knows that the border is so bad he wants to ignore it. Last night, members get to invite a guest, one guest each. The number of people, of these members who invited families that sat and had a child die from fentanyl. I met a man and woman last night who lost their son, who was an Eagle Scout, who was straight-A, he was in college—who wasn’t buying fentanyl. It was laced with something else that he was just purchasing, and this was the problem, because it didn’t come from the border. Every community is now a border community. Fentanyl is now across this nation, and where is it starting, where’s it coming from? China, through our border,” McCarthy said.
The Epoch Times has reached out to the White House for comment.
