Democrats are blaming the sequester for the economic sluggishness laid bare by the March jobs numbers released this morning by the Bureau of Economic Statistics.
The sequester is “part of the equation” that contributed to those numbers, according to White House press secretary Jay Carney. He pointed to both the “anticipation of the sequester” and the onset of budget cuts triggered by it as causes of the reduction in job growth and said that, in the long term, the sequester will cost 750,000 jobs.
Senate majority leader Harry Reid argued that the country cannot afford “self-inflicted setbacks” like the sequester.