Martha Roby: “I appreciate the opportunity to be here this evening alongside some of my freshman colleagues. We want to have a real…”

“I appreciate the opportunity to be here this evening alongside some of my freshman colleagues. We want to have a real frank discussion with the American people tonight about a milestone that we hit just last week. This is not a milestone of historic significance that we're proud of, and that is that our national debt has now hit $16 trillion. This brings no pride or cause to celebrate to the American people, nor should it to any Member of this body or our friends in the Senate or in the White House. That is approximately $51,000 for every man, woman, and child in this country. It's unacceptable, and it doesn't, quite frankly, have to be this way. I want to point you to a few of the President's own words that he said when he was campaigning to be the President of the United States: We can't afford another 4 years of the kind of deficits we've seen during the last 8. We can't afford to mortgage our children's future on another mountain of debt. Where are we today? Today we're at a place that is far worse than 4 years ago. With our debt now at $16 trillion, we've not seen anything significant from this White House in an effort to reduce our debt. Instead, all we hear about is new programs that are going to require more taxpayer dollars and not an effort to rein in this out-of-control spending. I want to talk about that tonight. Tonight we also want to focus on jobs. This is the number one issue facing the American people right now.…”