The Hill News

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said Tuesday he'd like to "exceed" the $32 billion in cuts laid out in his latest spending proposal.

Ryan, the chairman of the House Budget Committee, suggested he'd embrace efforts by conservatives to cut spending levels even lower than what he had proposed in a measure to fund the federal government through the rest of the year.

"I'd like to exceed it," Ryan said on CNBC, when asked if he'd be able to pass his continuing resolution (or, "CR") that cuts spending to 2008 levels.

Ryan unveiled his CR last week, and Republicans had promoted it as cutting nearly $74 billion. But that figure was calculated as a cut from President Obama's budget request, and not spending that had been allotted. In reality, Ryan's CR would cut about $36 billion from the budget this year.

Conservatives pounced on the proposal, though, and called for deeper cuts. They have pointed to the GOP's "Pledge to America" from last fa! ll's campaign, which called for $100 billion in cuts this year, and said they'll accept "no less" than that figure.

Ryan said the issue for him was whether a heftier cut would be able to escape the Democratic-held Senate.

"That's a Harry Reid problem," he said.

And the Wisconsin conservative embraced the coming efforts to make further cuts, which House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has guaranteed by allowing an "open" process for the CR debate, where lawmakers will be free to offer whichever amendments they like.

"I'm excited about this debate we're having, and this is the beginning of the beginning. People say, 'Oh, gosh, you just put this spending cut out there,' as if this is all we're going to do," Ryan explained. "This is just the start. This is just for the rest of this fiscal year. This is the beginning of the beginning."