‘Changes in fiscal policy must be made to address the budget situation…’
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney called out Republicans for being “a lot less interested” in the federal deficit under President Trump than they were under former President Barack Obama.
The GOP is “very interested in deficits when there is a Democrat in the White House,” Mulvaney said during hs speech at the Oxford Union, according to the Washington Post. “The worst thing in the whole world was deficits when Barack Obama was the president. Then Donald Trump became president, and we’re a lot less interested as a party.”
Mulvaney said he finds the $1 trillion deficit “extraordinarily disturbing,” but added that he seems to be one of the only D.C. politicos who still cares.
The GOP is still “evolving” under Trump, he said, and fiscal conservatism is not a priority anymore.
An annual congressional report last month revealed that the U.S. budget deficit is likely to burst through the symbolic $1 trillion barrier this year, despite a growing economy.
“This has been a growing problem because spending continues to rise,” said Jason Pye, vice president of legislative affairs for limited-government advocate FreedomWorks. “Sadly, both parties in Congress have irresponsibly allowed discretionary spending to grow while ignoring mandatory spending, which is the driver of budget deficits. If Congress continues to ignore this problem, it will result in higher borrowing costs, larger budget deficits, and, very likely, a painful sovereign debt crisis that will harm Americans.”
Under Obama’s presidency, the U.S. faced a similar crisis.
Now, the economy is thriving, which makes “the large and growing deficit all the more noteworthy,” said Congressional Budget Office Director Phillip Swagel.
“Changes in fiscal policy must be made to address the budget situation, because our debt is growing on an unsustainable path,” he said in the CBO report.