Michele Bachmann: Obama Brought 'Unnecessary Drama' With Congressional Pay Raise (VIDEO)

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) slammed Obama for bringing "unnecessary drama" by approving a Congressional pay raise in the midst of the fiscal cliff fight.

Obama signed an executive order Thursday calling for an end to a years-long pay freeze that would give returning members of Congress, federal workers and Vice President Joe Biden a half-percent to one percent pay increase. The fiscal cliff deal blocked that pay hike for members of Congress.

Before Congress passed the fiscal cliff deal, Bachmann introduced legislation to take away the pay increase. The former GOP presidential hopeful claimed Obama "decided to take the law into his own hands and in effect become his own congress" by giving it approval:

And it would be this: When there is massive uncertainty, unfinished business, he would decide, that he would unilaterally give a pay increase to the United States Congress, exactly when the public is uncertain and doesn’t know what’s going to happen. Will their taxes go up? Will they no longer be recipients of a spending program? And so now Congress is going to get a spending increase?

This was a cynical, planned move, Mr. Speaker, on the part of our president. He brought great drama to this effort. Unnecessary drama. Because you see this House of Representatives already did the job to avert the fiscal cliff. We did this work. It was completed last August. We said that no one’s taxes need to go up. And we were able to offset any spending cuts. The work was done.

Bachmann continued to hammer Obama for "castigating the House of Representatives" over the last year.

"This is drama. Unnecessary drama," Bachmann said. "President Obama bears the responsibility for his failure to lead and his intentional effort it appears to mislead the American republic with this cynical bill."