Budget Package Without Tax Cuts Would be ‘Failure,’ Gingrich Says

House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) said Saturday a balanced-budget package that does not include tax cuts would be a “failure.”

He also reiterated his position that hearings should be held on the government’s handling of the standoff with the Branch Davidians in Waco, Tex., in 1993.

The House-passed budget plan would cut $1.4 trillion in federal spending and eliminate the federal budget deficit by the year 2002. It includes $350 billion in tax cuts over seven years.

A Senate plan calls for $1 trillion in spending cuts, but would provide tax breaks only after a balanced budget is locked into law.

Democrats have criticized Republican efforts, saying they want to cut services to the needy to give tax cuts to the rich.

Gingrich indicated during the taping of CNN’s “Evans & Novak” that the Senate version would be unacceptable without a tax cut.

One proposed tax credit would provide some families $500 per child. “Most Americans prefer to have the parents spend the money rather than bureaucrats,” Gingrich said.

On other topics, Gingrich backed House hearings into the Waco standoff and said Democrats were “derelict in their duty” for not investigating the incident when they still controlled Congress.

“Anytime 85 Americans die in a government action, there is, I think, a requirement for hearings,” he said. “It would have allowed people to have a better sense that their rights were being protected if we had had those hearings in the last Congress.”