Paul Ryan Quotes

Paul Ryan - Quotes

A troubling pattern is emerging in the quotes from Paul Ryan. Some of these quotes from Paul Ryan are half-truths. As shown below, these Paul Ryan quotes are also hypocritical.

A politician telling half-truths should surprise few, but what makes these quotes from Paul Ryan matter more than the quotes from other politicians is that Paul Ryan is being touted as the man whose plan we should trust to solve our budget and debt crises. If Paul Ryan cannot be trusted to tell the truth on small matters, he cannot be entrusted with weightier matters.

For example, in his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, Paul Ryan decried:

"The biggest, coldest power play of all in Obamacare came at the expense of the elderly. ... They just took it all away from Medicare - $716 billion - funneled out of Medicare by President Obama."

What he didn't mention is that long before Obamacare became law, he - Paul Ryan - put those same "$716 billion" of Medicare cuts into his budget plan. Moreover, his budget plan has other clauses aimed at cutting Medicare much more than Obamacare does. 


In his Republican National Convention speech, Paul Ryan also criticized Barack Obama for not heeding the debt commission's final report:

"[Barack Obama] created a bipartisan debt commission. They came back with an urgent report. He thanked them, sent them on their way and then did exactly nothing."

Paul Ryan was a member of that "bipartisan debt commission" and actually voted against its final report, so he criticized the President for rejecting what he also rejected.

(For the far more egregious Mitt Romney platform quotes, click here.)

In the same speech, Paul Ryan also blamed Barack Obama for the closure of a General Motors plant in his hometown of Janesville, Wisconsin, lamenting:

"A lot of guys I went to high school with worked at that GM plant. Right there at that plant, candidate Obama said: 'I believe that if our government is there to support you ... this plant will be here for another hundred years.' That's what [Barack Obama] said in 2008. Well, as it turned out, that plant didn't last another year."

That GM plant closed in late 2008, before Barack Obama took office in 2009. Since Paul Ryan resides in Janesville and, "a lot of guys I went to high school with worked at that GM plant," he cannot claim ignorance of the plant's closure date.



In 2009, while decrying the economic stimulus as government cronyism, Paul Ryan wrote at least four letters to Energy Secretary Stephen Chu asking for stimulus money to be given to companies that contributed to his political campaign, including Wisconsin Energy Conservation Corporation that eventually received $20 million.

But in 2010, Paul Ryan told Boston's WBZ Radio that he, "did not ask for stimulus money," declaring, "I'm not one who votes for something and then writes to the government to ask them to send us money." For the next two years, Paul Ryan maintained this. In early August 2012, he repeated in a television interview with WCPO Cincinnati, "I never asked for stimulus."

When confronted with evidences that he had written the aforementioned letters asking for stimulus money, Paul Ryan quietly issued a statement on August 16, 2012 conceding, "After having these letters called to my attention I checked into them. ... They should have been handled better, and I take responsibility for that."

Two weeks later, he neither took responsibility nor mentioned his own pursuit of the stimulus money when he decried in his Republican National Convention speech:

"The stimulus was a case of political patronage, corporate welfare and cronyism at their worst. You, the working men and women of this country, were cut out of the deal."

Was he accusing himself of engaging in "political patronage, corporate welfare and cronyism at their worst," or hoping that the national audience remains largely unaware of his own admission just two weeks earlier?

Even on subjects unrelated to politics, Paul Ryan has shown a tendency to bend the truth.

For example, when questioned about his physical fitness, Paul Ryan told Hugh Hewitt Radio on August 22, 2012 that he doesn't "run marathons anymore," adding, “I was fast when I was younger," and boasted that he used to finish marathons in, “under three [hours], high twos. I had a two hour and fifty-something.”

After being confronted with the truth, Paul Ryan has since admitted that he has run only one marathon in his life and took over 4 hours to finish it.