Did You Know...

**Written by Doug Powers

During President Obama’s “the sequester’s coming to devour your paycheck” news conference Friday morning, he made this claim:

“Starting tomorrow everybody here, all the folks who are cleaning the floors at the Capitol. Now that Congress has left, somebody’s going to be vacuuming and cleaning those floors and throwing out the garbage. They’re going to have less pay. The janitors, the security guards, they just got a pay cut, and they’ve got to figure out how to manage that. That’s real.”

That’s not real. Four Pinocchios according to Glenn Kessler at the Washington Post:

Obama’s remarks continue the administration’s pattern of overstating the potential impact of the sequester, which we have explored this week. We originally thought this was maybe a Two Pinocchio rating, but in light of the AOC memo and the confirmation that security guards will not face a pay cut, nothing in Obama’s statement came close to being correct.

CNN’s Dana Bash:

despite obama claim pay cuts to begin for capitol janitors & “security guards” (aka police), SAA Gainer tells me no plans for pay cuts yet

— Dana Bash (@DanaBashCNN) March 1, 2013

From CBS News — note how the Capitol superintendent doesn’t refer to Obama by name, but rather as a “high ranking official.” Heh:

The president’s mention prompted Carlos Elias, the superintendent of the U.S. Capitol building and the Capitol Visitors Center, to email his employees within hours of Mr. Obama’s comment.

“The pay and benefits of EACH of our employees WILL NOT be impacted,” Elias wrote.

“There was a specific mention in the news today by a high ranking official that said ‘The employees that clean and maintain the US Capitol will receive a cut in pay’ (not specific quote but very close to it),” Elias continued.

If the sequester is going to be so horrible why the need to lie about its effects (like this) right out of the gate?

Also, don’t miss Michael Ramirez’s pie charts for a little more sequestration perspective (h/t Doug Ross).

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe