DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz released the following statement after Senate Republicans voted to block the Buffett Rule, which would ensure that millionaires and billionaires are paying their fair share in taxes, just like middle-class families across the country:

“Today, Senate Republicans spoke loud and clear: millionaires and billionaires are their priority, not the average hardworking American. We know the current tax code is stacked against the middle class, which is why the President introduced the Buffett Rule. It provides a simple change to our tax code that is rooted in basic American principles: hard work should pay off, responsibility should be rewarded, and everyone should do their fair share. President Obama believes that America prospers when we’re all in it together and we all play by the same rules.

“Evidently, Republicans in the Senate don’t feel the same way. By blocking the Buffett Rule, they’ve voted to keep protecting costly tax loopholes for the wealthiest Americans instead of actually investing in programs vital to the economic security of the middle class. The Buffett Rule isn’t the only measure that is needed to get spending under control and reduce the deficit, but it’s an enormous step in the right direction. We can’t just cut our way to prosperity; we need all Americans to pay their fair share, which is the entire point of the Buffett Rule. It’s time for Republicans to get serious about growing the economy and getting our country back on track. Sadly, today’s vote makes it clear they still aren’t willing to do the right thing for America’s middle-class families.”

Earlier today on MSNBC’s The Daily Rundown, Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz discussed the Republican Duck, Dodge, and Dismantle plan – the “Ryan Plan on steroids.” It would require draconian cuts that would harm the economic recovery and slash important programs like Medicare and Social Security.

The Duck, Dodge and Dismantle plan is simply an abdication of responsibility. It’s reckless. It would slash Social Security and Medicare. It would tie Congress' hands and that's not what we were sent here to do.

Today, in his first major economic speech as a presidential candidate, Tim Pawlenty laid out his vision for the country's economy. He proposes cutting taxes for the wealthiest Americans and slashing the tax rate for corporations from 35 percent to 15 percent—a move that would explode the national deficit and hurt America's seniors and working families most of all.

In response, Debbie Wasserman Schultz released the following statement:

Tim Pawlenty's plan to extend and expand the Bush tax cuts, deeply slashing taxes paid by the wealthiest Americans and corporate America and sending our deficit soaring even higher, is not an economic plan—it's a prescription for economic disaster that would fall squarely on the backs of seniors and working families. Mr. Pawlenty would take the Republican policies of the last decade, which exploded our deficit and debt and nearly sank our economy into a second Great Depression, and inject them with steroids.

Of course, perhaps no one should be surprised that Mr. Pawlenty, who left the state of Minnesota with a massive budget deficit, is now proposing to explode the deficit at the federal level. Tim Pawlenty left the people of Minnesota with a budget and economic nightmare. When Tim Pawlenty left the governor's office, middle-class families and small-business owners were paying higher property tax bills, college students were paying more for tuition, and at the same time funding for special education and services to seniors had been slashed. Even after raising taxes on hardworking Minnesotans and slashing vital services, Mr. Pawlenty left the state saddled with an historic $6.2 billion projected deficit.

On budget and fiscal matters Tim Pawlenty failed the people of Minnesota, and now he wants to impose such misguided and wrongheaded policies on the rest of us. No thank you.