Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, isn’t taking kindly to New York GOP Rep. Peter King’s comments that he no longer remains bound to the no-higher-tax pledge that he signed.
King said signing the commitment to refrain from supporting tax increases only applies to one session of Congress. “A pledge you signed 20 years ago, 18 years ago, is for that Congress,” King told NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday.
But that’s not how Norquist sees it. “The pledge is not for life, but everybody who signed the pledge, including Peter King, who tried to weasel out of it, shame on him,” Norquist said on CNN’s “Piers Morgan Tonight” Monday. “I hope his wife understands that commitments last a little longer than two years or something.”
Watch Grover Norquist with Piers Morgan. Story continues below.
King and other Republicans such as Georgia Sen. Saxby Chambliss and South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham have said they are willing to jettison the pledge to reach a budget compromise with Democrats that would avoid the fiscal cliff.
“Hey, if you think a commitment is not for as long as you make it for, the commitment for the pledge, as Peter King well knows when he signed it, is that as long as you’re in Congress, you will [rein in] spending and reform government and not raise taxes,” Norquist said.
“It’s not for 500 years or two generations. It’s only as long as you’re in the House or Senate. If he stayed too long, that’s his problem. But you don’t tell the bank, ‘Oh, the mortgage, wasn’t that a long time ago?’ If you make a commitment, you keep it.”
Most Republican congressmen have signed Norquist's pledge.
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