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House Speaker Paul Ryan of Janesville, who announced last week that he won’t seek reelection, says a lot has been accomplished in the past fifteen months, including the tax reform he says will reinvigorate the economy in next decade.
“Personal income tax revenues ride over the decade, corporate income tax revenues rise over the decade. Entitlement spending grows by $2 trillion dollars,” Ryan told members of Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce meeting in Madison Friday.
Ryan said Congress missed its best chance at “entitlement” reform last year, when Obamacare repeal was defeated. “It failed by one vote in the Senate (Arizona Republican John McCain),” Ryan said. “That one move took the biggest opportunity we’ve ever had on fundamental entitlement reform, and killed it by one vote.”
Ryan said that a bipartisan commission will need address health care programs like Medicare and Medicaid. “We do not have support from the other party, and you cannot do something this big and this profound without some bipartisan buy-in.”
Ryan also said that the rewrite of the federal tax code is going to make the U.S. economy so much stronger. “The kind of economic growth we were trying to unleash with tax reform is exactly what’s happening,” he said.
Ryan also said he is not yet ready to make an endorsement in the 1st Congressional District. The GOP field so far includes Paul Nehlen, who holds white nationalist views and who Ryan trounced in the Republican primary two years ago. Asked about what’s next for him, Ryan said “I’ll figure that stuff out in 2019.”