Reagan Can’t Honor 10% Pay-Cut Offer--It’s Illegal

To help ease the blow of his proposed budget cuts, President Reagan and Republican congressional leaders said in December that they would be willing to lead the way by taking a 10% pay cut.

But no pay cuts for them show up in the Administration’s fiscal 1986 spending proposals released today.

Now that Reagan is in his second term, his personal offer to help slash government spending can’t be fulfilled. White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said officials discovered that it is unconstitutional to diminish or increase the $200,000-a-year compensation given the President during his elected term of office.

“Nobody ever stood up” to volunteer for the pay-cut plunge, White House spokesman Larry Speakes said.

Speakes told reporters today that Reagan wants to give the Treasury what would amount to 5% of his salary--if Congress agrees to an Administration proposal to slash federal workers’ pay by 5% and realize a savings of $1.6 billion.

“President Reagan told me this morning that he will take a voluntary pay cut” equal to the same one that federal civil employees would get under his budget, Speakes said.

The 10% pay cut plan was discussed at a Dec. 6 White House meeting between Reagan and the GOP congressional leadership as a means of bolstering support for the Administration’s $40 billion in spending cuts.

After the session, Speakes said Reagan would be willing to take the cut to help lead the way on slashing government spending.

“The President would go along with that,” Speakes said at the time.