The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is making it clear that it will not let Republicans walk away from once backing their newly-minted vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan's controversial budget plan. The DCCC announced its latest attack on Tuesday, launching automated phone calls that would highlight 50 Republicans voting for Ryan's plan and how the plan would impact Medicare.
The committee released a transcript of a sample phone call:
Hi. This is Julie calling from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee to alert you to a new development about Medicare.
Your Congressman, Dan Lungren, voted for a budget that would end Medicare and now the budget’s architect, Paul Ryan, is the Republican candidate for Vice President.
A nonpartisan analysis showed that Ryan’s budget would raise health care costs for seniors by $6,400. The Tax Policy Center also said the Ryan budget would give people making over $1 million a year an average tax break of $265,000. And Congressman Lungren supported all of it.
That’s just wrong.
Call Congressman Dan Lungren at (916) 859-9906 and tell him to stop protecting millionaires at the expense of Medicare and the middle class.
Mitt Romney's decision to attach Ryan's name to his ticket has placed a renewed focus on the Wisconsin congressman's budget, causing some Republicans in competitive congressional races to immediately distance themselves from the Ryan plan and its more radical components. Democrats have nevertheless seized on Ryan's new role within the party in a bid to cast Republicans as intent on protecting tax cuts for the wealthy at the expense of critical entitlement programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.