Idaho Congressman Mike Simpson issued the following statement after President Obama’s State of the Union speech tonight.

 “I am frustrated that the president persists in playing politics with the issue of tax reform.  Dividing Americans for political gain is not tax reform, and putting Band-Aids on our broken tax code does nothing to fix it. What we really need is for Republicans and Democrats to come together to implement fundamental tax reform to bring about a new tax system that lowers the rate and broadens the base, creating a simpler and fairer tax code. This, in conjunction with significant spending reductions and reform of our entitlement programs that are on auto-pilot spending, would go a long way toward creating the growth necessary to revitalize our economy and bring our deficit under control.

“The president talks a lot about job creation, but his policies have done nothing to remove the real roadblocks to true economic recovery.  He says he wants to boost American manufacturing, but since his inauguration the Obama administration has proposed over 200 new regulatory actions—many unnecessary--that would each cost our economy over $100 million. Last year the president proposed a budget that did nothing to address the deficit crisis our nation is facing, and Democrats in the Senate haven’t passed a budget in 1000 days.  He hasn’t given us hope of anything better this year, further convincing the American people that their government cannot solve problems.”