Congressional Lawmakers Point Fingers With Deficit Poised to Skyrocket

With the federal budget deficit projected to soar over the next decade, members of Congress are pointing fingers as to who’s most responsible for the nation’s financial troubles.

“I try to be careful not to blame the president for everything, or my Democrat colleagues for everything, but I think their failed economic policies and their unbridled spending has put us in a situation where we have to bring these costs down,” House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington (R-Texas) said at a Feb. 14 hearing.

The purpose of the hearing was to discuss the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) latest projections for the budget and economic outlook over the next 10 years. In its Feb. 7 report, the CBO estimated that the deficit would be $1.6 trillion this year, and that it would climb to $2.6 trillion by 2034.

Mr. Arrington, citing those figures, noted that the report’s one “bright spot” was the revelation that deficit spending projections for the short term had decreased year over year thanks to the passage of the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA).

A product of last year’s debt-ceiling negotiations between then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and President Joe Biden, the FRA implemented a $1.59 billion discretionary spending limit for fiscal year 2024—a $12 billion reduction from 2023. According to the CBO, those cuts are estimated to save the country roughly $1.6 trillion over the next decade.

Warring Perspectives

Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.), the committee’s top Democrat, had a different view of the nation’s fiscal health than that of Mr. Arrington. Pointing to the 3.7 percent unemployment rate and falling inflation, Mr. Boyle heralded the economy under President Biden as “remarkable.”

“One year ago … everything you could read from Bloomberg to Forbes to down the line was projecting a recession,” Mr. Boyle said. “Literally, one headline from about a year ago said ‘a 100 percent chance of a recession.’ Did we end up having a recession this past year? No.”

Rep. Robert Scott (D-Va.) echoed his optimism, suggesting that the current economy is not only “good” but beneficial to reducing the deficit.

“Can you say a word about the effect of a good economy on the budget?” Mr. Scott pointedly asked CBO Director Phillip Swagel, the hearing’s sole witness.

“A strong economy means more job creation, and more revenue would tend to improve the budget,” Mr. Swagel replied.

Meanwhile, Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) suggested that cutting IRS spending—as House Republicans have sought to do—would have the opposite of the desired effect.

“We had comments suggesting how in the world can it be that if you cut spending for the IRS, that you actually increase the deficit,” he noted, asking Mr. Swagel to explain how that could be.

“So, we look at the uses to which the IRS would put those additional resources,” the director said. “Customer service helps people … understand their obligations and pay them. Enforcement helps the IRS go after people who don’t meet their obligations, and those have a return.”

Solutions

For Republicans, the answer to reducing the deficit was cutting spending.

“We need to do more FRA deals that reduce spending, but we need to focus on mandatory programs,” Mr. Arrington contended, noting that mandatory spending will account for nearly 80 percent of the federal budget by 2034.

Spending that falls into the mandatory bucket includes entitlement programs, such as Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. But suggesting cuts to those programs has always been an unpopular political move.

“These are programs that workers paid into over a lifetime of work,” Mr. Boyle said. “As we are looking to address in the long term the challenges we have with both trust funds, we must do nothing whatsoever that would imperil those programs or push through devastating cuts that are absolutely unwarranted and unjustified.”

Rep. Janice Schakowsky (D-Ill.) agreed, asserting that entitlement programs are “the thing that make America great.” But Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.), chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, found that attitude to be part of the problem.

“I’m thankful to hear that she wants to make America great again, but I don’t think that’s through growing government programs, which further exacerbate our debt situation and why we’re here today,” he said.

Meanwhile, Rep. Drew Ferguson (R-Ga.) said the budgetary process itself needed to be reformed, holding that the CBO’s inaccurate projections had also worsened the problem.

“We consistently miss the mark on the accuracy—and this is true for both sides,” Mr. Ferguson said. “And it is really hard for both Republicans and Democrats to go argue their points with a sense of confidence when year in and year out, CBO gets it wrong.”

Citing the CBO’s inaccurate cost projections for the Inflation Reduction Act and the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the congressman asked Mr. Swagel how the American people could be expected to trust the agency’s latest projections.

“I can tell you I am very confident that the fiscal trajectory is unsustainable under current law,” Mr. Swagel said. “And, you know, that’s one of the key messages of our budget projections.”

Mr. Ferguson found no fault with that conclusion, but said he thought it was important that the experts Congress relies on have the necessary tools to make accurate predictions.

Mr. Arrington said he appreciated that input, as well as a remark Mr. Ferguson had made that trying, to him, “is simply failing slowly.”

“If trying is failing slowly, I wonder what that means for Congress, who, we often don’t try at all,” the chairman said.

Mr. Ferguson replied, “Mr. Chairman, I surmise that based off of the last few years, we’re not failing slowly—we’re failing pretty damn fast.”