Duffy to Senate: 'Get Off Their Hind Ends' on Healthcare

Healthcare reform has to come before tax reform can be completed, and that means the "Senate has to get off their hind ends" and come up with a compromise, Rep. Sean Duffy said Tuesday.

"As we do tax reform, we're trying to contort ourselves and deal with Senate filibuster rules," the Wisconsin Republican told Fox News "America's Newsroom" anchor Bill Hemmer.

"We're working on tax reform in committees in the House and Senate, but the only way to get tax reform done because of those Senate rules is if we get healthcare done."

For that to happen, Duffy said, the Senate has to compromise so it can match the House with an Obamacare repeal measure.

"If that happens, we can use the revenue from Obamacare to move the tax dials down and get taxes done," said Duffy, while flatly rejecting a Monday story in The Wall Street Journal that blamed the block on tax reform on Washington's status quo.

Instead, Duffy said, the committees in both the House and Senate are working hard to pull together a tax reform bill, but there are still two problems.

"If you keep the Senate rules the way they are, you have to let healthcare go first," Duffy said.

President Donald Trump on Tuesday tweeted a call for senators to "go nuclear" to get healthcare and tax reform through, but Duffy warned that government does not move "at the speed of business."

"We're not even halfway through this administration in the first year, and you have a healthcare bill that sits in the Senate," Duffy said. "We'll repeal and replace Dodd-Frank out of the House next week. We're making progress on tax reform. Working on a conservative budget. Things are happening. Our agenda is moving forward."

But the concern is, he continued, that all the House bills will get locked up in the Senate, but people shouldn't give up on the Republicans' agenda moving forward.

"You have really one year in this first year of the administration to get these big items through and time is running short," Duffy said. "We have a big agendas we get through the summer. Hopefully tax reform will be part of that."

• Ryan Keeps Pushing on Border Adjustment Tax Plan
• Mnuchin to Kudlow: Trump Committed to Getting Tax Reform 'Quickly'