White House Press Secretary Jay Carney on Wednesday refused to entertain a question from ABC News reporter Jonathan Karl regarding the cost of one of President Barack Obama’s common golf outings.
Several reporters were questioning Carney over the Obama administration’s decision to cancel White House tours in order to avoid Secret Service furloughs and cutbacks due to sequestration cuts.
“The Secret Service told us that the tours cost $74,000 a week. How much is it going to cost for the President to travel later this week to Illinois?” Karl asked.
“Well, the president is the President of the United States,” Carney replied bluntly. “And he is elected to represent all of the people. And he travels around the country, appropriately. I don’t have a figure on the cost of presidential travel. It is obviously something, as every President deals with because of security and staff, a significant undertaking. But the President has to travel around the country. He has to travel around the world. That is part of his job.”
“How much does it cost for him to go and play golf?” Karl followed up.
“Jon, again, you’re trivializing an impact here. People will lose their jobs. Three-quarters of a million people will lose their job,” Carney said.
“This is about choices. You have a certain amount of–” Karl began before being interrupted.
“Right. The law stipulates what the costs will be for each agency. Those jobs will be lost, okay? And you can report on White House tours, or you can find out what the impacts are out in the real world, additional impacts are. This is a real-world impact here, and it is unfortunate. And it is an unhappy choice,” Carney added.
Carney went on to say “Congress made this choice” in regards to sequestration. Carney never did respond to Karl’s question about the cost of Obama’s golf trips.
Watch the video via CSPAN/Mediaite below:
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/03/13/jay-carney-did-not-like-this-abc-reporters-question-about-cost-of-obamas-golf-outings-youre-trivializing-an-impact-here/#
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