Watch McCain discuss the stimulus bill on American Morning Monday.
WASHINGTON (CNN) - Sen. John McCain says he'd vote against the bill backed by President Obama to pump up the economy.
The former GOP presidential nominee said Monday on CNN's "American Morning" that he's working with a group of fellow Republican senators to come up with an alternative package that emphasizes payroll tax cuts, incentives for people to stay in their homes, and an end to the stimulus spending when the economy begins to recover.
Related: Senators work for bipartisan support on stimulus
The Senate is expected to begin debate Monday on a nearly $900 billion stimulus plan. An $819 billion dollar version of the bill passed the House of Representatives last week without a single Republican vote. All 177 GOP House members voted against the legislation, saying it was too heavy on spending and too thin on tax cuts.
McCain's hungry for more tax cuts in the bill, saying "we would like too to see more incentives such as a $15,000 tax credit for home ownership. We would like to see elimination of these policy changes which have nothing to do with jobs, we want the stimulus package to focus on jobs."
And McCain says that some provisions in the current bill, crafted by Congressional Democrats, need to go, adding that "many of the policy changes they put in have nothing to do with stimulating the economy."
The senator from Arizona also called for serious negations with the Democrats who run the Senate, saying that '"we are clearly prepared to sit down, discuss, negotiate, a try to get a stimulus package that will create jobs. We all know how tough the economy is. It's been rammed through the Senate so far, we need to seriously negotiate. We haven't done that yet. We can do it, though."
From CNN Politics
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This coming from the man who mindlessly repeated Bush's "the economy is strong, and getting stronger" mantra as the financial world collapsed. Why don't you go to one of your six homes and retire? That is, if you can remember where any of them are!
America these fools lost the elections!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm pretty sure that McCain is just still mad that he did not win and he just wants to make Obama look bad.
This guy is such a joke. The same old story from him and all the Republicans. " The rich come first ". Does anyone actually believe that this man is out for " country first " ? if you do, you are in " la la " land.
What is funny to me is the Repubicians are calling for more transparency in how the bill is spent. They didn't do such a great job with the TARP funds, why should they even have an opinion.
What good are payroll taxes cuts, as mentioned in the first paragraph of this article, to someone who DOESN'T HAVE A JOB!
Every Rep., is talking about this is a bad plan and not a stimulas bill.
But want did Bush do nothing to try to get back on track. Rep wants
more tax cuts and tell me how taxs cuts is going to create jobs.
This will take time for all of us to get out of this mess. It took 8 years
to put us in this mess and President Obama is trying to turn this
mess to a message and the Rep., wants more tax cuts. Tax cuts
may help some Americans but we need jobs to pay our taxes. and bills. JOBS JOBS JOBS .
Jeff in Ohio:
If 5 people out of 100 had voted Republican,the election would have been won by McCain,that's not beat bad.
John who???!!!
YOu can leave this in moderation CNN as usual...
Why do we even care what Mcsame thinks. He needs to retire and play checkers at the home. Enough of the old guys club, its time for newer thinking.
So, McCain will not vote for this stimulus because it doesn't have $15000 tax incentive for home ownership. If i am right, he owns 7 houses and the tax incentive would give him an additional $105,000. Way to go McSame, i can see you put your Country first. Why don't we give all the tax payer's money to the GOP and bend over........
Pelosi trying to cram this pork down our throat. Not this time liberals.
It is extremely important for the Dems to get a lot of Repub support on this. The reason is that if it does not work and actually hurts the economy it will have a huge impact in elections in 2, 4, and 6 years forward.
The upside is that if it works well and does what it was intended to do then the Dems could take all the credit.
I seriously doubt that will happen though. People need to be put to work but many of the programs in this bill are not "permanent" jobs unless Congress throws more and more money at the programs in a few years. Then we would be discussing another 1 Trillion dollar stimulus which would only prove the first one didn't work.
Bipartisan support is necessary. THat means negotiations and concessions from both sides.
If neither side is willing to budge then both sides are to blame and we the people should stop thinking that only Repub or Dems can lead this nation and start voting for other candidates.
Maybe that time has already come and gone.
He's pathetic.
"hungry" for tax cuts. A bit slanted there aren't we CNN? Would you ever write that Obama is "hungry to raise taxes on the wealthy"? I think not. Journalism is dead.
Sounds like a sore loser to me. Why is he not getting the message the American people have sent. We want you to be more bipartisan and work together not act childish.
Wow! McCain actually has a backbone....sometimes. Maybe he's finally learning that "reaching across the aisle" to Dems is a waste of time.
McCain is still bitter that he lost the presidential election. I mean come on, here is a man who act psychotic during the first phase of the economic stimulis by suspending his campaign. I swear, this man is crazy! Thank God he isn't our president!
One more thing! The Republicans are blasting Obama's stimulus ideas by saying that there is too much spending. Come on! These are the same people who for six years gave Bush a blank check and ran our deficit up to the highest in U.S. history. What a contradiction! Where were they three, six, or eight years ago? It is because of them and their out of touch policies that we are in this mess.
Good ... vote against the welfare in disguise
McCain is such a desperate, unsympathic figure. He, as well as his desperate and unsympathic side kick just can't get out of the way of the camera and they will do anything, and everything, just to pretend they have some revelance in politics today. They do not.
Memo from McCain to Democrats: "We mave have created the enormous financial mess we're in now, but I'll be damed if we're going to let you suceed at cleaning it up".
The Republicans just can't get it.
Yawn. McCain has said for at least a month that he would vote against the package in its current form. It would be nice if the Senate could work in a truly bipartisan effort to cut needless spending and optimize the effectiveness of the package, but I'm not holding my breath.
Once upon a time long time ago there used to be a man named john Mcain who suspended his compaine to vote for the stimulus bill. NOW WE HAVE A MAN NAMED JOHN MCAIL WHO WILL NOT VOTE FOR PRESIDENT OBAMA'S STIMULUS BILL. SIMILAR NAMES BUT TWO DIFFERENT PERSONS.HARD FOR MY LITTLE BRAIN TO DECIEDE WHICH JOHN MCAIN WAS RIGHT.
It's just like the GOP to give "tax credits" for home ownership. How about those senior citizens who don't make enough money to pay taxes? My parents are paying an obscene amount of taxes and utility bills in the city where they live. It's very sad that the elderly and the very poor are being pushed out of their homes because of inflation and because the benefits go to only the wealthy. Why don't you just donate one of your homes to an underprivileged family, McFlame? Most of the Senate and Congress are so out of touch with reality – and greedy!
I think they need to get this thing done as soon as possible or the consecuenses of playing politics will be a disaster for every body and they will regret it later on deeply.