Rep. Labrador: Democrats Acting Like ‘Bank Robbers’ on Fiscal Cliff

Idaho Republican Rep.Raul Labrador said on Sunday that he’s “not really sure” Democrats want to avoid going over the fiscal cliff, and that they’re like “bank robbers” who want to raise taxes on everyone.

Labrador, appearing on ABC News’ “This Week,” also believes President Barack Obama has successfully provoked a civil war among Republicans, which has been the Democrats’ goal from the beginning.

“They have tried to get us to fight against each other on taxes when — I’m not really sure that they don’t want to go over the fiscal cliff,” said Labrador.

Meanwhile, Labrador was one of the House Republicans who opposed a plan by House Speaker John Boehner to raise taxes only on people making more than $1 million. But he said if Democrats really wanted to avoid the fiscal cliff they could have voted for the bill.

“There were only about 50 of us in the House who said that we were not going to vote for John Boehner's deal last week,” he said. “All they needed was 50 Democrats to vote for the deal, and it would have passed last week.”

But, Labrador said, the Democrats have been trying to divide Republicans “from day one.”

“They have tried to get us to fight against each other on taxes when — I'm not really sure that they don't want to go over the fiscal cliff,” he said. “They want to expand the growth of government. They need more revenues. You know, Democrats are like bank robbers. You don't have the money in the 2 percent — the money is in the 100 percent. They want to raise taxes on everyone.”

Labrador also said history will repeat if leaders talk about raising taxes.

“What happens in Washington is that we talk about raising taxes today and then we talk about cuts 10 years from now,” Labrador said. “It happened under Reagan, it happened under Bush, and it's what's going to happen to us once again.”