GOP rep: I have read ‘wide swaths’ of tax bill, not the whole thing

Rep. Sean Duffy (R-Wis.) said in a Wednesday morning interview that he has not read “every word” of the House tax bill, but has read “wide swaths” of the legislation.

“So I have read — I can’t say every word — I’ve read wide swaths of it and summaries on others,” Duffy told CNN’s “New Day” when asked if he has read the entire bill.

CNN Host Alisyn Camerota during the interview argued that the GOP tax overhaul push “happened so fast.”{mosads}

Duffy told CNN that summaries of specific parts of the bill are useful due to the complicated nature of tax code. 

The congressman deflected criticism over how Republicans pushed tax reform, slamming how he said Democrats similarly pushed ObamaCare legislation years ago.

“The bill text has been out there for a long time,” Duffy said.

The House on Tuesday passed the tax-reform legislation after it went through the conference committee. But the lower chamber must vote on the bill again after the Senate parliamentarian ruled that two provisions in the House legislation were not compliant with budget rules for the reconciliation process.

The Senate early Wednesday morning passed the bill, which Republicans are expected to send to President Trump before Christmas.

Duffy defended that the bill has been available and able to be read and analyzed.

“But to say that this hasn’t been out there, the American people can’t analyze it — if you wanted to read it or your viewers wanted to read the whole text, word for word, and not big swaths and certain summaries of others, you could do it,” Duffy said.