Rep. Yarmuth Calls Trump’s $4.8 Trillion Budget 'Destructive'

President Trump released his annual

budget

yesterday. The four-point-eight

trillion

dollar spending plan will impose some deep cuts to social programs while increasing spending on defense and entitlements, and that will raise the gross federal debt to more than $30

trillion

over the next decade. US House Budget Committee Chairman John Yarmuth responds to President Trump's proposal by writing what the president has presented as a

destructive

and irrational

budget

that intentionally goes after working families and vulnerable Americans. He has broken his promises to the American people. Congressman John Yarmuth joins us now from the Capitol. Great congressman. to talk to you thank you very much so if that's how you feel about the budget what's your solution well one question what's the problem right now we have two problems we have a deficit problem it's getting worse now we're dealing with a trillion dollars a deficit of over a year, which is a very significant increase since Donald Trump was in office, but we also have a deficit in the country, we have an infrastructure deficit, we have an education deficit, we have to start doing investments in the American people if we are going to have a stable foundation for our future and right now, when interest rates are still very low, is the right time to do it.

Instead, what this Republican budget proposes is to cut taxes and extend them even further after 2025, that is, an additional 1.5 trillion. dollars of reduction in revenue for the government and they made up for it with significant cuts to Medicare Medicaid Social Security the SNAP program many of our what we call our automatic stabilizers that are there to protect people in the event of a downturn in the economy, for which this has exactly the wrong priorities, but it's the same playbook that Republicans have used for the last two decades whenever they can cut taxes and then cut entitlement programs to pay for them well.

I mean, we all know the budget deficit is a problem, but it's not like Democrats are also addressing entitlements the way they need to be to get them under control, so what can you recommend? Actually, one of the things we've been working on is some very important initiatives to reduce prescription drugs. prices, which is one of the largest drivers of our healthcare costs and, therefore, our Medicare and Medicaid spending. We would love to get the cooperation of Republicans in Congress and the administration to work on that with us. We already passed HR 3 legislation which we believe goes a long way, we are working on more, but we need to have a bipartisan effort to handle this.

I read the other day that Utah state employees are now being sent to Mexico with the state money they are paying. their plane tickets and giving them $500 to go buy their medications in Mexico, that is absurd in this country and there are some steps that we know we can take to make a difference in that area, the other problems are, although Alyx, we have a " we". We have an aging population, 10,000 people a day turning 65, that's not going to change, so we either have to bring in new people to help pay income into Social Security and Medicare or we have to take a very hard look at what's driving the increase in those medical expenses, so there seems to be relatively little chance of any of this happening, so how do you move forward if you want to continue to grow the economy that the Republicans are looking at, say 3%?

It seems very difficult to reach, what can be done? To get to maybe two or two and a half if you want to keep saying cut taxes or something or don't raise taxes, we've had several economists. Before the budget committee they have spoken about this very thing and one of the biggest problems we have now is that we do not have enough people in the country, we need comprehensive immigration reform to bring people to the country to grow the economy. increase the tax base and fill a lot of the jobs that people are looking for, there's really no answer to that unless everyone becomes a lot more fertile very quickly, but we can do it with comprehensive immigration reform and we should, that's really what The only immediate thing that I think we can do to stimulate the growth of the economy is that we can invest in that is sure to make a difference and we have a proposal that we put forward last week to do that in a pretty significant way. but other than that, it's not a tax cut for the very rich.

The CBO came to the committee last week with our annual report that said that tax cuts only 20% of the cost of tax cuts is recovered through the economy, so 80% of tax cuts are reduce. GDP and last year was 1% so again we can't keep doing the same thing over and over again what Republicans want to do thinking a trickle down strategy works never has and won't so that obviously there is a primary in New Hampshire. Also taking place today is which candidate would be best suited to do what you say you want to do. That's a big question that I haven't supported in the race and I think the key factor won't necessarily be who is next. person sitting in the White House depends on what kind of Congress you have and I think that's really what we need to focus on is who can, who can not only win the White House but can also bring people to the Senate and preserve our majority in the House because otherwise, whether it's Bernie Sanders or Joe Biden or any of the others, they won't be able to pass an agenda.