House Republicans debuted a new line of attack against Democrats on Wednesday, calling the GOP the party of "accountability and trust in government" in the wake of several recent controversies involving the Obama administration.

Armed with new uproars involving the IRS's admission that it had targeted conservative advocacy groups, the release of more emails involving the administration's response to last year's terrorist attack in Benghazi and the Justice Department's having monitored the phone record of AP journalists, the House GOP leadership said that they would emphasize transparency in the coming weeks, and hope to make it a central issue in the 2014 midterm elections.

"The public is beginning to raise questions in their mind as to is this government accountable? We are going to work here in the House to restore the trust in government," said House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va.

House GOP Conference Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers, Wash., added: "What the American people expect from their government is accountability."

The new line of attack comes amid a terrible, five-day stretch for the White House. Republican aides told NBC News that the trifecta of controversies had breathed new life into the GOP conference, which recently had been riven my internal disagreements, especially as most legislative action plays out in the Democratic-held Senate.

Democrats, of course, took issue with Republicans' efforts to seize the mantle of transparency.

"Members of both parties want to exercise the appropriate oversight role of Congress into these matters, but the idea that this Republican leadership has been interested in doing anything to the federal government other than destroying it, would be a thorough rewrite of the last two years," said Drew Hammil, a spokesman for House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

Republicans would have another opportunity to drive their new message on Wednesday afternoon, when Attorney General Eric Holder appears for a House committee for a general oversight hearing. There, he'll he’ll be peppered with questions about why the Justice Department went after reporter’s phone records. And next Wednesday, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee will hold a hearing on the political targeting by the IRS. Aides say also to expect more hearings related to Benghazi throughout the year.

For his part, House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, stressed the party would still push the economy as an issue but would also uphold their “responsibility under the Constitution to provide oversight over the Executive Branch."

The top elected Republican in Congress says he's looking for prison sentences for those associated with IRS efforts to single out conservative advocacy groups applying for tax-exempt status.

House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, stoked conservative ire toward the Obama administration on Wednesday in the wake of an IRS inspector general report chastising agency employees for subjecting conservative and Tea Party groups to additional scrutiny.

"My question isn't about who's going to resign," Boehner said at a weekly press conference on Capitol Hill. "My question's about who's going to jail."

While the IRS report suggested that the employees' actions were not prompted by any outside influence, Republicans have nonetheless seized on the controversy, and openly suggested that the administration was deliberately targeting conservatives through the IRS.

"“Basically all we’ve gotten from the IRS, on the other hand, is an attempt to scapegoat some folks out in Cincinnati and a laughable attempt to move past this whole issue with a ridiculous op-ed claiming ‘mistakes were made,'" Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Wednesday morning on the Senate floor.

McConnell and the other 44 Senate Republicans all signed a letter to the administration demanding that IRS witnesses and materials be fully made available to congressional investigators.

"There are laws in place to prevent this type of abuse," Boehner said. "Someone made a conscious decision to harass and hold up these requests for tax exempt status. We need to know who they are, and whether they violated the law. Clearly, somebody violated the law."

This story was originally published on Wed May 15, 2013 10:34 AM EDT

House Speaker John Boehner, Ohio, publicly distanced himself on Thursday from another member of his Republican leadership team who criticized a component of President Barack Obama’s budget having to do with entitlement reform.

Boehner said that he had spoken with Rep. Greg Walden, Ore., the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee who on Wednesday criticized “chained CPI,” a part of Obama’s 2014 budget which changes how Social Security benefits are calculated to grow over time.

Walden has fallen under increased scrutiny from conservatives, who have threatened a primary challenge, along with Democrast who wish to cast the House GOP leadership as mired in discord.

"I've made it clear that I disagree with what Chairman Walden said," Boehner said at his weekly press conference, calling the chained CPI proposal "the least we must do to begin to solve the problem of Social Security."

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Walden, speaking Wednesday on CNN, was sharply critical of the chained CPI proposal contained with President Barack Obama’s 2014 budget.

“Well, once again, you're trying to balance this budget on the backs of seniors and I just think it's not the right way to go,” he said. “I don't see this budget as either on time, adding up, balancing, and, further, I think it really does go right at seniors in a way they're going to be shocked, coming out of the administration.”

The problem for Walden, however, was that the chained CPI proposal was included as an enticement of Republicans, who have clamored for any sort of entitlement reform from the White House. Moreover, Obama’s decision to include such a concession – which would essentially amount to a cut in benefits, over time, for seniors – angered progressive supporters of the president.

White House press secretary Jay Carney on Thursday noted that the chained CPI proposal in Obama’s budget came “at the specific request of behest of Republican leaders and represent a “cynical attempt to disown a proposal that came from Republican leaders.”

The NRCC chairman’s comments drew the ire of many fellow conservatives, and in short order.

"Greg Walden ought to think about clarifying his remarks on chained CPI, and think about clarifying soon," said Chris Chocola, the president of the fiscally conservative Club for Growth.

But when he did offer a clarifying statement, Walden doubled down on his original sentiment.

“Chairman Walden supports the budget passed by House Republicans that preserves and protects Medicare and Social Security while also balancing the budget in 10 years,” said an NRCC spokesperson. “He disagrees with President Obama's political plan that hurts current seniors just so he can pay for more wasteful spending."

Walden’s difference with fellow Republicans, however, illustrates Republicans’ difficulty in handling the politics of entitlement issues in recent years.

Mitt Romney and his running mate, Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan, for instance were sharply critical of the $716 billion in Medicare savings contained within Obama’s health care reform law, and vowed to restore the cuts if elected. But Ryan’s subsequent budget this year, in his capacity as chairman of the House Budget Committee, counts those very cuts in Medicare reimbursements to hospitals and reinsurers toward balancing the budget.

Moreover, Ryan’s budgets for the past three years – which Republicans have generally supported in overwhelming fashion – have called for sweeping changes to Medicare, namely by transforming it into a private marketplace in which the government would provide a voucher (or “premium support” payment) to seniors to buy insurance for themselves.

Democrats eagerly used those Medicare proposals against Republicans in the election of 2012, further cementing entitlement programs’ reputation as a “third rail” in politics, which politicians should not touch, or risk political peril.

As First Read wrote this morning, President Barack Obama's budget is expected to contain an additional $1.8 trillion in deficit reduction over 10 years -- including a measure to change the way cost-of-living increases are calculated for Social Security recipients. 

The outline, which mirrors an abandoned compromise offer from the White House to House Speaker John Boehner last year, is already causing griping on the left because the entitlement changes would effectively decrease payments to beneficiaries.

But the budget isn’t exactly getting a ringing endorsement from Boehner either. The House Speaker said in a statement Friday that the White House is holding the entitlement reforms "hostage" by asking for further revenues. 

Boehner's full statement follows: 

"The president and I were not able to reach an agreement late last year because his offers never lived up to his rhetoric. Despite talk about so-called balance, the president's last offer was significantly skewed in favor of higher taxes and included only modest entitlement savings. He said he could go no further toward the  middle, and that's why his last offer was rejected.  In the end, the president got his tax hikes on the wealthy with no corresponding spending cuts. At some point we need to solve our spending problem, and what the president has offered would leave us with a budget that never balances.  In reality, he's moved in the wrong direction, routinely taking off the table entitlement reforms he's previously told me he could support.

"When the president visited the Capitol last month, House Republicans stated a desire to find common ground and urged him not to make savings we agree upon conditional on another round of tax increases. If reports are accurate, the president has not heeded that call. If the president believes these modest entitlement savings are needed to help shore up these programs, there's no reason they should be held hostage for more tax hikes. That's no way to lead and move the country forward." 

This story was originally published on Fri Apr 5, 2013 10:46 AM EDT

Alaska Rep. Don Young, R, issued a new statement late Friday formally apologizing for his use of a slur to describe immigrant laborers.

Young, who had endured demands by Democrats and other fellow Republicans -- including House Speaker John Boehner -- to apologize for the use of the term "wetbacks" in a radio interview on Thursday, issued a statement doing just that.

Young said in a statement:

"I apologize for the insensitive term I used during an interview in Ketchikan, Alaska.  There was no malice in my heart or intent to offend; it was a poor choice of words. That word, and the negative attitudes that come with it, should be left in the 20th century,  and I’m sorry that this has shifted our focus away from comprehensive immigration reform."

Young had appeared on KRBD radio on Thursday, where he made his initial remark.

"My father had a ranch; we used to have 50-60 wetbacks to pick tomatoes," Young said. "It takes two people to pick the same tomatoes now. It’s all done by machine."

The 21-term congressman issued a statement that evening explaining that he meant no offense by using the ethnic slur, which he said he had learned during a childhood on farms in California.

But Republican leaders, who must repair the party's dismal image among the increasingly influential Latino voting bloc, were quick to distance themselves from Young, and demand a fuller apology.

"I don’t care why he said it – there’s no excuse and it warrants an immediate apology," Boehner said.

House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, on Friday demanded an immediate apology from a fellow Republican congressman, who referred to laborers with the derogatory term "wetback."

Related: Republicans and Latinos chide Rep. Young's for racial slurs 

The Capitol's top elected Republican condemned Alaska Rep. Don Young's comments during a radio interview on Thursday, in which he casually used the slur to refer to farm workers whose jobs have been rendered useless by technological advances.

"Congressman Young’s remarks were offensive and beneath the dignity of the office he holds," Boehner said in a statement. "I don’t care why he said it – there’s no excuse and it warrants an immediate apology."

Young said Thursday on KRBD: "My father had a ranch; we used to have 50-60 wetbacks to pick tomatoes. It takes two people to pick the same tomatoes now. It’s all done by machine."

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Young said in a subsequent statement released by his office that he "meant no disrespect" by the remark, explaining that the term was one used commonly during his days growing up on a farm in California.

The comment, though, threatens to inflame Republicans' already-poor standing among Latino voters, an increasingly influential voting bloc who favored President Barack Obama and many Democrats during last fall's campaign.

Democrats, already, have seized upon the comments.

"As the Republican minority outreach efforts develop, I’d advise their strategists to list 'don’t say racial slurs like 'wetback'' as a bedrock for their messaging," said Rep. Rubén Hinojosa, Texas, the chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, on Friday.

The risk of political fallout for Republicans stemming from Young's remarks have prompted other Republicans to condemn the remarks on Friday.

"The words used by Representative Young emphatically do not represent the beliefs of the Republican Party," said Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus, who oversaw the recent release of a report stressing the need to improve the GOP's outreach to Hispanic voters.

"As I have continued to say, everyone in this country deserves to be treated with dignity and respect," Priebus added. "Our party represents freedom and opportunity for every American and a beacon of hope to those seeking liberty throughout the world. Offensive language and ethnic slurs have no place in our public discourse."

"Migrant workers come to America looking for opportunity and a way to provide a better life for their families. They do not come to this country to hear ethnic slurs and derogatory language from elected officials," said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, the No. 2 Senate Republican. "The comments used by Rep. Young do nothing to elevate our party, political discourse or the millions who come here looking for economic opportunity."

This story was originally published on Fri Mar 29, 2013 11:42 AM EDT

Citing his schedule and the coming budget debate, House Speaker John Boehner said Thursday that he will not accompany the U.S. delegation to Rome for the investiture of Pope Francis.

The delegation will be led by Vice President Joe Biden. Both men are the highest-ranking Catholic U.S. officials of their respective parties.

“I am grateful for the invitation to attend the papal investiture in Rome with Vice President Biden, and would like to be able to join the trip,” he said in a statement. “Unfortunately, my duties in the House next week - including hosting President Obama and the Prime Minister of Ireland at the Capitol on Tuesday, and the debate on the budget - make that impossible.” 

Asked by NBC yesterday about the election of Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Argentina, Boehner congratulated the new Pope and praised the choice of a pontiff from outside Europe.

“I'm happy that they were able to come to a choice as quickly as they did,” he said. “I think that reaching out beyond the traditional continent of our church is another big step in the right direction for our church.”

This story was originally published on Thu Mar 14, 2013 11:54 AM EDT

While visiting with the House GOP conference for just the fourth time in his presidency, President Obama received some breaking news -- the College of Cardinals had elected a new pope. Sources in the room tell NBC News that Obama aide Rob Nabors handed the president a note saying that white smoke was billowing out of the Vatican.

Obama then told the House GOP Conference that there was a new pope, to which the Republican audience cheered and clapped. One GOP member joked, “Does that white smoke mean the tours at the White House are back on?” to which the president replied, “They’re on at the Vatican!”

Obama told reporters the meeting with the GOP “good and useful,” and said he was looking forward to finding out who the new pope would be.

Twenty minutes later when the news broke the new Pope would be Argentinian Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH), the highest ranking Catholic Republican in the country, congratulated the new Pope and expressed delight that the Bergoglio hailed from South America, “I'm happy that they were able to come to a choice as quickly as they did. I think that reaching out beyond the traditional continent of our church is another big step in the right direction for our church.”

This story was originally published on Tue Mar 5, 2013 1:49 PM EST

In an exclusive interview with NBC’s Meet the Press, House Speaker John Boehner said there is no easy way to stop the budget cuts -- known as the “sequester” -- that began taking effect Friday night, and voiced uncertainty over how Washington can solve the overall fiscal problems that have consumed the nation’s politics for more than two years.

“I don't think anyone quite understands how it gets resolved,” Boehner admitted in his interview with NBC’s David Gregory.

Boehner explained his strategy in the Republicans’ tax-and-spending standoff with President Barack Obama, saying that he didn’t want to “arbitrarily pull out a couple of tax expenditures” just to raise the revenue needed to avert $85 billion in spending cuts which are being made this year.

The president and many of his administration officials have warned of dire consequences to government services and national security if the sequester happens as planned.  But to avoid them and reach a deal, the president wants new tax increases, something Boehner and his fellow Republicans have insisted are off the table.

The spending cuts – which were intended to spur a bipartisan “grand bargain” on deficit reduction, entitlement reform and tax increases -- are part of the 2011 Budget Control Act which Obama signed into law.

Boehner voted for the law and urged his members to do likewise.

But now that the spending cuts are beginning, neither Boehner nor Obama wants them to continue. Yet they have been unable to reach an accord on an alternative measure.

Related: As meeting yields no breakthrough, Obama blames 'dumb' cuts on GOP, signs order

Larry Downing / Reuters

Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, speaks briefly after a meeting with President Barack Obama at the White House March 1, 2013.

Boehner insisted that Obama should abandon his effort to get more tax increases and instead focus on spending.

“Every American, in these tough economic times, has to find a way to balance their budget. They've got to make choices,” Boehner said. “They expect Washington to live within its means and to make choices as well.”  

He said, “It's time for the president and Senate Democrats to get serious about the long-term spending problem that we have.”

And he noted that if Obama has a credible alternative to the sequester, “why wouldn't Senate Democrats go ahead and pass it?”

Obama has insisted that any plan to replace the sequester must include new tax increases, for example by changing the tax treatment of corporate jets, and by ending tax preferences for oil and gas producers.

But Boehner said Obama had already gotten his tax increase in the deal that he made with Republicans in December. “The president got $650 billion of higher taxes on the American people on January the first,” Boehner said. “How much more does he want?”

Boehner did say that a comprehensive tax reform law would be a way to spark growth. That, in turn, would produce more tax revenue for the federal government.

“American family's wages aren't growing,” the House speaker said. “They're being squeezed. And as a result, we've got to find a way through our tax code to promote more economic growth in our country.  We can do this by closing loopholes, bringing the (tax) rates down for all Americans, making the tax code fairer. It will promote more economic growth.”

Obama said Friday it may take some time before members of Congress agree to bargain with him on how to replace the spending cuts.

He told reporters that he hoped that “after some reflection, as members of Congress start hearing from constituents who are being negatively impacted… that they step back and say, all right, is there a way for us to move forward on a package of entitlement reforms, tax reform, not raising tax rates, identifying programs that don't work, coming up with a plan that's comprehensive and that makes sense.”

He said, “It may take a couple of weeks. It may take a couple of months” before that happens, but in the meantime the spending cuts will dampen economic growth and hurt federal workers who are furloughed and federal contractors who lose work.

“It's going to mean hundreds of thousands of jobs lost,” he said. “That is real. We're not making that up.  That’s not a scare tactic, that’s a fact.”

But Boehner said, “I don't know whether it's going to hurt the economy or not. I don't think anyone quite understands how the sequester is really going to work.”

The speaker said the House would pass a spending plan this week to fund the government through the end of the current fiscal year, which ends on Sept. 30, and that in his conversation with Obama at the White House Friday, the president had agreed “that we should not have any talk of a government shutdown. So I'm hopeful that the House and Senate will be able to work through this.”

Following Boehner on Meet the Press, Obama economic advisor Gene Sperling said Boehner ought to be willing to consider at least $400 billion more in tax revenue increases over the next ten years as part of a larger agreement on deficit reduction.

Sperling said Obama has already agreed to require higher-income Medicare recipients to pay higher premiums for their coverage than they now pay and has agreed to change the formula for Social Security benefits, which would in effect reduce benefit increases over time.

These were difficult concessions for Obama to make, Sperling said.

In the face of congressional Republicans charging that Obama and his aides have been exaggerating the effect of the spending cuts – with one House Republicans calling their effort “Scarequester” – Sperling said, “Nobody ever suggested that this harmful sequester – which the speaker himself said would be devastating to national security – was going to have all its impact in the first few days.”

But he argued that the spending reductions will “hurt a lot of communities that rely on military spending” and hurt public education.

As House Republicans begin to see the impact he said he hoped they “will choose bipartisan compromise over this absolutist position.”

He noted that on Saturday Obama made phone calls to both Democratic and GOP  senators to form a “caucus of common sense” and support an alternative to the spending cuts. 

With the sequestration cogs now turning, in the coming weeks Congress will turn its attention to its next budget deadline on March 27, when funding for the federal government is set to expire.

Without a Continuing Resolution (CR) approved by Congress, the country could face a government shutdown in addition to the existing sequestration cuts. 

House Speaker John Boehner said Friday that he intends to bring up a CR next week that would avert a shutdown – a fight he says he would like to avoid while Congress is working to cushion the blow of the across-the-board government cuts which were set to go into effect March 1. 

“I’m hopeful that we won’t have to deal with the threat of a government shutdown while we're dealing with the sequester at the same time,” Boehner told reporters after a meeting between Congressional leaders and President Obama at the White House to discuss the budget cuts.

The CR the House will consider next week will keep spending levels the same as last year, but with the caveat that sequestration would drop that level lower if those cuts are not dealt with in the coming weeks and months. 

The Republican bill would also give flexibility to the Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs Departments in an effort to allow them to move funding around in ways that a straight extension of government funding would not. 

The CR, which would keep the government running through September, would keep government funding levels at $1.043 trillion, but because it would be subject to sequestration, the level could effectively drop to somewhere around $974 billion for the 2013 fiscal year.

House Republicans seem surprisingly galvanized around this plan, considering there was originally concern amongst conservatives that allowing any wiggle room to avoid sequestration would not be something they would support. 

Rep Mick Mulvaney, R-S.C., a notable conservative, told reporters this week that he would support the strategy, and House Republicans met as a conference on Wednesday to discuss the CR, a meeting that aides said went well.

The question is whether House and Senate Democrats will support the plan, or instead ask for more flexibility for other departments not associated with the military.

Asked today if House Democrats would support the Republican-proposed plan, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said she would have to look at the specific language of the bill before making a decision.

“It would be curious to me if at that level the Republicans can produce the votes to pass (the CR),” Pelosi told reporters, “But certainly we don't want to have a shutdown of government.”

Government funding was scheduled to expire on October 1^st, 2012, but Congress passed a six-month CR in September to avoid government shutdown talks ahead of the November elections.  The bill passed the House with bipartisan support, 329-91.

NBC's Carrie Dann contributed to this report. 

This story was originally published on Fri Mar 1, 2013 5:57 PM EST

Despite a “polite” meeting between congressional leaders and the president, Republicans see no short-term pathway to a budget compromise, House Speaker John Boehner told NBC News Friday.

“Listen, we’ve known about this for sixteen months,” Boehner told NBC’s David Gregory in an exclusive interview on Capitol Hill after the White House meeting. “And yet, even today there’s no plan from Senate Democrats or the White House to replace the sequester.”

Asked by Gregory if he sees any path forward for compromise, Boehner offered a less-than-optimistic assessment of the bipartisan session with Obama and the vice president. 

“If I did, that meeting at the White House today might have gone better,” Boehner replied. 

The full exclusive interview will run on NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday. Check your local listings. 

This story was originally published on Fri Mar 1, 2013 2:06 PM EST