LIVE VIDEO: GOP Presidential Candidate @MittRomney formally introduces @PaulRyanVP as his VP pick. http://bit.ly/QPOGCG#Decision2012
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Romney's VP Pick: Paul Ryan
Romney campaign announces news via smartphone app
Rep. Paul Ryan, the young, charismatic congressman from Wisconsin who authored the GOP's budget proposal, will be Mitt Romney's vice presidential candidate, the Romney campaign confirmed Saturday.
"Mitt's choice for VP is Paul Ryan," said a statement released in the Romney campaign's VP app. "Spread the word about America's Comeback Team #RomneyRyan2012."
Romney and Ryan will make their first appearance as a team in Norfolk, Va., in front of USS Wisconsin, at 9 a.m. ET, just before they launch a four-day bus tour in battleground states.
Ryan launched a new Twitter account Saturday morning, @PaulRyanVP, and posted his first tweet: "I'm honored to join @MittRomney on America's Comeback Team."
NBC News first reported the Ryan selection late Friday night, citing three sources close to the campaign.
Ryan is a rising star in the Republican party, a young, charismatic politician considered the party's budget expert. The seven-term congressman authored the House-backed budget plan that seeks to curb overall entitlement spending and changes Medicare into a voucher-like system to save costs.
Ryan is the first House member to get the VP nod since Geraldine Ferraro in 1984, according to Politico.
The Wall Street Journal, in an editorial on Thursday, praised Ryan as a strong choice for Romney: "The case for Mr. Ryan is that he best exemplifies the nature and stakes of this election. More than any other politician, the House Budget Committee chairman has defined those stakes well as a generational choice about the role of government and whether America will once again become a growth economy or sink into interest-group dominated decline."
Ryan's proposed budget was a political lightening rod. The Republican party nearly unanimously backed it -- all but 10 Republican congressman voted for it last year -- but Democrats said it would increase the tax burden on the middle class and savage Medicare. The proposed budget would transform Medicare into a voucher program and lower the top tax rate from 35 percent to 25 percent. It would cut spending by $5.3 trillian over 10 years, and would balance the budget by 2040.
"We've spent 18 months trying to make House races about their plan for Medicare and Mitt Romney just did it for us overnight," one Democratic operative told NBC News.
Ryan has long slammed Democrats for failing to adequately address the budget crisis.
"By failing seriously to confront the most predictable economic crisis in our history, the President's policies are committing us and our children to a diminished future," Ryan said in a speech last year.
Earlier this year, speaking to Associated Press news executives, Obama said Ryan's budget was "so far to the right, it makes the Contract With America look like the New Deal."
The 42-year-old Ryan was born in Janesville, Wisconsin. His family owned a prominant construction business that was founded by his great grandfather -- Ryan worked there briefly before running for Congress -- but his father eschewed the family business to become a lawyer.
Paul Ryan received a bachelor's degree in economics and political science at Miami (Ohio) University, then entered politics. He worked for several politicians, including Bob Kasten, Jack Kemp and Sam Brownback.
In 1998, at age 28, he ran for Congress and unseated two-term incumbent Mark Neumann.
In Congress, he's been a staunch fiscal conservative, although he did vote for TARP and the auto bailout in 2008. The same year, though, he first introduced legislation to curb the budget through major alterations to Medicare. The next year, he proposed a budget that slashed the top tax rate from 35 percent to 25 percent.
Ryan will help Romney tighten support among the GOP base who believe the federal government has expanded its reach under President Obama. Through his budget proposals and speaches, Ryan has led the Republican drive to shrink government.
Romney's choice comes as he tries to repair an image damaged by negative Democratic advertising and shift the trajectory of a campaign that's seen him lose ground to President Barack Obama in recent polls.
The vice presidential selection will dominate headlines, and Romney's team has been relentlessly teasing the announcement for weeks.
Ryan's selection — as well as Romney's own nomination — will be ratified by delegates to the Republican National Convention that begins on Aug. 27 in Tampa, Fla.
