Carney’s answer was this: “Well, I will – on the specific actions that members of different legislatures have taken, I’m not going to judge that, but I will – from here. But I will say that there is nothing wrong with – as the President made clear in his interview with a Wisconsin television station, he firmly believes that state legislatures and governors need to address their fiscal issues, just as he is working with Congress to address fiscal problems at the federal level.
“His view is that it is important that everyone work together towards that goal; that public sector employees obviously have to tighten their belts, others have to tighten their belts, but that this should not be an effort that goes after some of the fundamental rights of collective bargaining in the name of reducing the deficit. Because that – I think it’s fair to say that the best outcomes will be when everyone sits at the table – executive branch, legislatures, union members – and deals with these issues in a productive way so that they can be resolved, precisely so that these states can get control of their budgets, as we are very aggressively trying to get control of ours.”