Though he knows it’s going to fail — or more likely because he knows it’s going to fail — Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) says he’ll vote for the House GOP budget when the Senate takes it up in the days ahead. But despite coming from a liberal state, and despite being up for re-election in 2012, he’s not hiding this support for that plan.
Brown announced his intent to vote for the plan publicly Friday in front of state business leaders in Georgetown, Mass.
“The leaders will bring forward (Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s) budget, and I will vote for it, and it will fail,” Brown said, according to the Newburyport Daily News. “Then the president will bring forward his budget, and it will fail. It will be great fodder for the commercials.”
In the past weeks, too, Brown has strongly suggested he likes the GOP approach.
Late last month, a tracker for the state Democratic party filmed Brown at a meeting in Westminster, Mass., praising House Republicans laying down a marker in the budget fight.
“Finally we had congressman Ryan come forth with a budget proposal, thank God, because we haven’t had one in a couple years and that now has forced the debate and forced the President actually to come forth with his budget proposal,” Brown said.
Democrats, predictably, are all over Brown for taking this position, putting him to the right of Newt Gingrich.
“Scott Brown makes Newt Gingrich look like the moderate,” said Matt Canter, communications director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. “Brown pretends he’s independent and pretends he’s moderate, but he’s making it crystal clear that he supports the Republican plan to end Medicare and will vote for it in the US Senate.
At least one other moderate Senate Republican — Susan Collins (R-ME) — has publicly announced her opposition to the plan.
Brian Beutler
Brian Beutler is TPM's senior congressional reporter. Since 2009, he's led coverage of health care reform, Wall Street reform, taxes, the GOP budget, the government shutdown fight, and the debt limit fight. He can be reached at brian@talkingpointsmemo.com.
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