The decision to add hundreds of billions of dollars to the federal budget just after the Republicans rammed through their very costly 2017 tax cuts is just mind-boggling in its irresponsibility.

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Within two months of the signing of the tax law, Congress passed two temporary funding measures, the second of which raised the debt ceiling as well as the spending caps that were placed on military and domestic spending during the Obama presidency (the spending caps were increased by around $300 billion). Then, one month later, Congress approved a 2,232-page $1.3 trillion appropriations bill, which covered federal funding for only six months.

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Of the bill, Senator Ben Sasse (R-NE) said, “Every Republican would vote against this disgusting pork bill if a Democrat were president. This spending kegger is a wildly irresponsible use of the taxpayers’ money, and the president should not sign it.” Just hours before the bill passed, Representative Jim McGovern, (D-MA) said, “In all honesty, none of us know what is actually in this bill.”

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But wait! There’s more! In August 2019, Congress and the Trump administration followed this up by approving a two-year $2.7 trillion budget, a move that required the debt ceiling be suspended until the end of July 2021. This was the fourth time Congress had voted to ignore the spending limits established by the 2011 Budget Control Act.

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Obviously, we have to fund the federal government, but not one penny of this $2.7 trillion went to fund federal agencies. Say what? Yep, funding for that was finally passed on December 19, 2019 – after, of course, Congress was forced to pass two stop gap spending bills to avoid government shutdowns.

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Then came President Joe Biden. During Biden’s one term in office, he approved $4.7 trillion in new ten-year debt through legislation and executive actions.

 

Which all now leads us to ….