Speaker Paul Ryan bemoaned the ‘broken’ state of American politics in his farewell address on Wednesday that both touted his achievements in office and got in a few swaps at the current political climate under President Donald Trump.
Ryan, 48, decided to retire at the end of the year after 20 years in the House of Representatives and three years as speaker.
His final speech came as Democrats prepare to take control of the lower chamber in Congress in January.
He spoke in the Library of Congress, which sits across the street from the U.S. Capitol building, in the ornate Great Room of the Thomas Jefferson Building with huge American flags hanging at either side.
Outgoing Speaker Paul Ryan gave his final address on Wednesday
Ryan accepts the Speaker’s gavel from Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi in 2017
‘The drivers of our broken politics are more obvious than the solutions,’ Ryan said.
‘Our complex problems are solvable,’ he added. ‘That is to say, our problems are solvable if our politics will allow it.’
Ryan was a reluctant speaker who took the job after John Boehner retired in 2015 and House Republicans came close to tearing themselves apart over who would lead them next.
He led his conference through the final years of Barack Obama’s time in the Oval Office; the contentious 2016 presidential primary and general election; and the first, turbulent years of Trump’s presidency.
He was Mitt Romney’s running mate in 2012 and, after that failed attempt at the White House, returned to Capitol Hill to lead the quiet life of a lawmaker he led before being thrust in the national spotlight: walking by himself (instead of a cadre of aides surrounding him) to votes, often times with headphones on, and standing in line in the cafeteria to buy his lunch.
That changed when he became speaker and took the marble office with a balcony looking down the National Mall toward the Washington and Lincoln Memorials.
Once a rising star in the Republican Party – part of a group known as The Young Guns – Ryan leaves a Capitol Hill plagued with disfunction and struggling to fulfill its basic functions such as funding the government.
Republicans – with control of both chambers of Congress and the presidency – failed to complete their longtime goal of repealing the Affordable Care Act last year.
And the tax reform bill they did passed has been criticized for helping the rich while raising the deficit.
America’s debt has grown since Ryan became speaker, rising from $438 billion in 2015 to $779 billion this year. Next year’s deficit is projected to hit nearly $1 trillion.
Then there is the relationship with the head of his party: Ryan and Trump has a love-hate back-and-forth as each man sat at their respective ends of Pennsylvania Avenue.
Initially a Trump critic – Ryan cancelled a 2016 campaign appearance with Trump after the infamous ‘Access Hollywood’ interview tape came to light – he worked to repair relations once Trump won the White House.
But the two men have vastly different styles: Ryan’s cool unflappable demeanor stood apart form Trump’s tough talk; Ryan loves policy, numbers, facts and figures; Trump tweets from the hip.
Ryan thanks the friends, former staff and fellow lawmakers who came to his speech
Ryan in a White House meeting with President Trump (center) and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (left)
And Ryan had to balance his form of economic conservatism with the president’s brash politics.
Friction was sometimes the result.
He, at times, tried to push the president away from his fiery rhetoric with veiled comments about civility.
And he seemed to do the same with some of his comments Wednesday, even as he never said Trump’s name.
Ryan spoke of his overseas travel at a time Trump has alienated America’s traditional allies and pushed his ‘America first’ policy.
‘The sense I get, from when I have traveled overseas as speaker, is that our allies wonder whether we are still in the game here,’ Ryan said.
He also addressed the negative tone in America, something Trump has used repeatedly in his critic of rivals and allies alike.
‘You can make a career out of criticism. You can deal from that deck all day long. Many do, and I certainly don’t begrudge that. It seems like an easy living,’ Ryan said.
‘But today, too often, genuine disagreement quickly gives way to intense distrust. We spend far more time trying to convict one another than we do developing our own convictions,’ he added.
Ryan argued technology amplifies the situation ‘with an incentive structure that preys on people’s fears, and algorithms that play on anger.’
Ryan’s final speech touted his achievements in office and got in a few swaps at the current political climate under President Donald Trump
Ryan with his wife Janna when his was the vice president nominee, appearing with then-GOP nominee Mitt Romney and Anne Romney
‘Outrage is a brand,’ he said.
Trump often uses anger and outrage in his prolific twitter account.
Then Ryan pivoted to a hopeful tone.
‘Nothing – nothing says it has to be this way,’ he said.
‘Our problems are solvable if our politics will allow it. I know it. I have seen it. In a confident America, we don’t shrug our shoulders and pass the buck. We roll up our sleeves and get on with our work. A confident America leads the world, too. Not with bluster, but with steady, principled action,’ he added.
Ryan’s legacy in Congress – his time heading the powerful Budget Committee and Ways and Means Committee along with his tenure of speaker – will be subject to debate.
But he touted what he is proud of in his 30 minute remarks to his former staff, fellow lawmakers, and friends. Former White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, an old Ryan friend from Wisconsin, was spotted in the crowd, as was Sen. Tim Scott, whom Ryan has worked on poverty issues with.
‘After years of doubt, years of the cynics saying it could not be done, we achieved the first major overhaul of our tax code in 31 years,’ he said of the GOP’s signature tax cut passed one year ago.
‘Think about it. We went from having the worst tax code in the industrialized world to one of the most competitive. This is something I worked on my entire adult life, and it is something that will help to improve people’s lives for a long time to come,’ Ryan added.
He also talked his time leading the Budget Committee, a time period the self-described ‘policy wonk’ is most proud of.
‘I’m proud that every year I was Budget Committee chairman, we passed in the House a roadmap to balancing the budget and paying off our debt,’ he said.
Those pieces of legislation usually never made it past the lower chamber.
Ryan gaveling the House into session at the Feb. 2017 State of the Union Address with Presiden Trump and Vice President Mike Pence
He also mentioned the long-running Republican fight to kill Obamacare.
‘In this Congress, we came within one vote of real health care entitlement reform,’ he said.
‘This House is the most productive we have had in at least a generation,’ he added. ‘To date, we have passed 1,175 bills, more than half of them with bipartisan support And – it is my duty as speaker to say this – nearly 750 bills that the House has passed remain stuck in the United States Senate. But the rest made it into law.’