Conservative caucus: White House 'fiscal cliff' strategy a 'trap'

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This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," December 18, 2012. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

SEAN HANNITY, HOST: There are breaking developments to report regarding the "fiscal cliff" showdown in D.C. The so-called "Plan B" was introduced this morning by House Speaker John Boehner. Now, the proposal calls for tax hikes on households that make more than a million dollars. That would include small businesses. However, it didn't take long for the White House to announce its opposition to the plan. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAY CARNEY, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I mean, the alternative here, if you think about it in the so-called "Plan B" is, makes no sense. There is an historic opportunity here to do something that has been set as a goal for a long time in Washington, which is reach a bipartisan compromise on significant deficit reduction on the order of $4 trillion, when you take all the pieces of it and put them together. We are very close to being able to achieve that and the president has demonstrated obvious willingness to compromise and to move more than halfway.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: We're also learning that House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said that the House will in fact have the votes necessary to pass the "Plan B", but let's be clear. What's really obvious is that the president rejected the offer simply because it doesn't raise enough taxes. But the problem that I and other true conservatives have with Boehner's "Plan B" is that it punishes the very people responsible for creating jobs in the country. Now, the speaker's falling directly into the president's class warfare trap instead of fighting for the principles that handed his party to the majority.

Now, he was sent to Washington like all Republicans, to reduce the size of government and cut taxes. Not the opposite. As a result, I think it's time we go back to the drawing board and draft up a conservative solution to the so-called fiscal crisis, which is generational theft, borrowing 46 cents of every dollar we spend. We'll call it "Plan C," Hannity's plan.

Joining me now with some very unique insight as to where things stand are three conservative members of the Republican Party. From Capitol Hill tonight, I'm joined by Congressman Jason Chaffetz, Congressman Tim Huelskamp and Congressman Louie Gohmert. Gentlemen, welcome to the program, good to see you all.

REP. LOUIE GOHMERT, R-TEXAS: Great to see you.

REP. JASON CHAFFETZ, R-UTAH: Thanks, Sean.

HANNITY: All right. Congressman Chaffetz, let me begin with you, your reaction to "Plan B." What are you being told about the negotiations, because my interpretation is we were going to be, you know, three to one spending cuts to tax increases or revenue increases. Now it's less than a dollar. So, what's going on?

CHAFFETZ: Well, what we heard in the morning and what we heard in the afternoon was very different. And what I heard in the afternoon, I actually really liked. Because given what's on the books right now, doing nothing, what is actually law is going to be the single, one of the single largest tax hikes we've ever had. And so, what we're going to do is if we do go with this modified -- I think I would call it the modified "Plan B" -- it would actually be one of the largest tax reductions. We'll going to protect about 99 percent of the people in this country from this massive tax hike.

In August, we already passed one that took care of a hundred percent of it. And also, it did something, what the debt limit -- it didn't raise the debt limit even one dime. This morning, we thought it was going to, by this afternoon that it had gone away, that makes it more palatable.

HANNITY: Congressman Gohmert, are you in the same camp as Congressman Chaffetz?

GOHMERT: Sean, we know that our big problem is too much spending. We know the President Reagan fell into the trap. And President George H. W. Bush fell in the trap. Here, just raise taxes on somebody and we'll come along with cuts later. Look, we cut ourselves, our own House budget over 11 percent over two years. That gives us the moral authority to say to every agency in the federal government, you're cutting your budget 11 percent. And not only that, in 2009, it was the Pelosi, Reid, Obama budget. And they spent more than a trillion dollars -- 1.5 or 6 trillion more than we brought in, which was around 2.2 or 3 trillion.

So why can't we go back to their budget in 2008 and say, you know what? This was Pelosi-Reid budget. It's been around 2.4, 2.5 trillion. That cuts over a trillion over where the president is. Let's go back to the Pelosi-Reid budget of 2008. There is a number of solutions, but spending has got to come down --

HANNITY: I agree.

GOHMERT: -- while we assure seniors, and veterans and everybody else, they're OK. We're not going to touch them.

HANNITY: All right. Congressman Huelskamp, I agree with Congressman Gohmert. It's spending. We've had very little discussion about cutting spending. The president is resistant. He wants tax increases and he wants to humiliate, in my opinion, Republicans. The biggest danger I saw in the negotiations on "Plan A" was that the president wanted four years of a blank check, then he's talking about the debt ceiling two years. And now there was talk maybe Congressman Boehner would give one year of a blank check to the president? Tell me that's not true.

REP. TIM HUELSKAMP, R-KAN.: Well, Sean, I'm afraid that this is exactly the trap that the president would like us to walk into to get Republicans to actually support a tax increase. And over the weekend, we know the speaker offered a trillion dollar increase in revenues -- I call that a tax increase -- and put that on the table. And if I was the president, I wouldn't have accepted either, I'd say, I want some more. And now he wants the entire House to step into something which by the way, on May 23rd, Nancy Pelosi asked for this vote, she said raise taxes on millionaires and we'd be satisfied with that.

So I think this is a serious distraction from the real issue. It's spending. Republicans should be for something. We should put something on the floor, which is a serious attempt to address the problem with spending and put that in Harry Reid's lap and say to the president, where are you're spending cuts?

HANNITY: Let me ask all three of you the following, because you guys have constitutional authority as it relates to the power of the purse. I would never give that up because I think it's really important that we need some adults in Washington. So the question I have for all three of you is, would it be at this point, if a deal is not going to be reached, would it be good for the Republicans to pass their own bill? Congressman Chaffetz, is it "Plan B," "Plan C"? What is it going to be?

CHAFFETZ: Well, in August, we did pass a bill that is sitting there over in the Senate that I think we all liked. You look at what this modified version is, there is no debt limit increase --

HANNITY: What is the difference in the modified version?

CHAFFETZ: Well, we don't have that. This morning there was news that maybe we would give them a two-year increase. There is no increase in the debt limit, which I think is what we need to do. We need to also make sure that 14 days from now, every single American is going to get a tax increase and if I can protect 99 percent of the people in this country from getting that tax increase, I want to do that. I think that's a responsible thing to do. I think it's a tax cut.

HANNITY: Louie Gohmert, would you support that?

GOHMERT: When Jay Carney says he's moved halfway on this thing, what you got to go back and see is the president demanded an extra $800 billion in tax increases. John Boehner starts out and says OK, we'll do that. And what do they do? They move to 1.6 trillion in tax increases.

HANNITY: Wait a minute. Congressman --

GOHMERT: It's very clear, the president doesn't want to deal.

HANNITY: Congressman Gohmert, would you support what Congressman Chaffetz said he would support about the 99 percent?

GOHMERT: It doesn't look good to me.

HANNITY: Congressman Huelskamp?

HUELSKAMP: Sean, I will not support this proposal. But let's be clear, "Plan A" is still underway. There is still negotiations going on at the White House. Harry Reid says, this bill goes in nowhere, but again it distracts us from the real problem. And I think there is still Americans out there that think if you raise taxes on the rich, somehow that's going to solve a trillion dollars deficit problem.

CHAFFETZ: Sean -- Sean, if we don't pass something, if we don't pass something in the next 14 days, every single American has a tax increase. It's $4 trillion to President Obama. I want to prevent that. We need to cut taxes. That's why I think this modified "Plan B" makes sense.

GOHMERT: If we don't cut spending, we're taxing our children and grandchildren.

CHAFFETZ: Amen. Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely.

GOHMERT: That's ridiculous.

HANNITY: All right. Gentlemen, thank you all for taking time out of your busy nights. Thank you, we appreciate it.

GOHMERT: Thanks, Sean.

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