President Biden’s Tax and Spend Budget
This week, President Biden released his $5.8 trillion Budget for FY23, and it is more of the same liberal, tax-and-spend policies that have led us to the economic crisis we’re facing. Under the proposal, deficits and debt would continue to grow over the next decade, leading to even higher inflation and greater financial hardship for the American people. This budget leaves families out to dry, and I questioned the Director of the Office of Management and Budget on Tuesday about this Administration’s runaway spending.
- If Biden’s budget were adopted, national debt would reach a new record by the end of the decade, growing by over $15 trillion.
- Under Biden’s budget, the national debt would spike to $45 trillion by 2032 – about $347,000 per household.
- Biden’s budget includes nearly $2.5 trillion in new or increased taxes.
- Biden’s budget would increase the corporate tax rate to 28%, higher than communist China, which the Tax Foundation estimated would kill 159,000 jobs, shrink the economy by $720 billion, and cut wages for low-income Americans.
Holding Health And Human Services (HHS) Accountable
On Wednesday, a report from the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis revealed that the Centers and Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) allowed the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) to re-write critical portions of the Biden Administration’s school reopening guidance. While the CDC initially planned to issue guidance that would have been more favorable toward opening schools, the agency reversed course after consulting with teachers union bosses. The AFT was given a non-public copy of the CDC’s draft language about a week before it was set to be published, and in that time, the union was able to insert its own langue verbatim. It is a disgrace that the Biden Administration put teachers’ unions above parents and students. Instead of following the science, they kept schools closed, leading to poor test scores and higher rates of youth depression, substance abuse, and suicide. President Biden must be held accountable for putting politics above children, and this week I pressed the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services about the matter in the Appropriations Committee.
Border Security
The President takes an oath promising to uphold and defend the laws of this country and to protect our Nation’s citizens. Yet this Administration seems determined to neglect that pledge. With more than 2 million migrants having illegally entered the United States since President Biden took office, there is an undeniable crisis at our southern border, and it is a direct result of the President’s halting of construction of the border wall, ending the Remain in Mexico policy, and reimplementing Catch and Release. Now, instead of taking steps to rectify the situation he created, President Biden is preparing to pour fuel on the fire by lifting Title 42, which has allowed Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to immediately expel illegal aliens after entering the country during the COVID-19 pandemic. This Trump-era code has been essential to mitigating a worsening crisis, and officials within the President’s own Department of Homeland Security are sounding the alarms about the consequences that would come from lifting this policy. Officials say that if this policy is revoked it would cause a massive run on the border and we could see upwards of 18,000 illegal crossings a day – that’s 6.5 million migrants a year. CBP can barely keep up as it is, let alone with that kind of surge. President Biden is failing the American people, and his neglect at the border is having catastrophic consequences.
Energy Crisis
During the Trump administration, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) was built up when President Trump added 30 million barrels of oil in 2020. Now, the Biden Administration has announced that it will release roughly a million barrels of oil a day from U.S. reserves for the next six months in an effort to lower gas prices. These 180 million barrels represent the largest ever draw from our emergency oil reserve and 25 percent of the total SPR reserves when at peak capacity. This move follows President Biden’s release of 30 million barrels in early March, and 50 million barrels of oil in November of 2021, which did nothing to prevent a spike in energy prices.
Make no mistake, this plan is dangerous. The SPR is supposed to be used for national security emergencies and major weather events, not for President Biden to use as a political Hail Mary when his policies fail. Drawing down our strategic reserves by more than 25 percent poses a national security risk, and represents a large expense to American taxpayers because it will be refilled under skyrocketing gas prices.
Thank you for the opportunity to serve as your Congressman. If my office can ever be of assistance, please contact my Washington office at (202) 225-5431. For the latest updates from Washington and across the Sixth District, please follow my Facebook and Twitter pages.