GOP to use debt limit to force spending cuts, McCarthy says
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www.washingtonpost.com /politics/2022/10/18/mccarthy-gop-medicare-social-security/
GOP to use debt limit to force spending cuts, McCarthy says
Eugene Scott 5-6 minutes 10/18/2022
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said that if Republicans win control of the House the GOP will use raising the debt limit as leverage to force spending cuts — which could include cuts to Medicare and Social Security — and limit additional funding to Ukraine.
“You can’t just continue down the path to keep spending and adding to the debt,” the California Republican told Punchbowl News in a recent interview. “And if people want to make a debt ceiling [for a longer period of time], just like anything else, there comes a point in time where, okay, we’ll provide you more money, but you got to change your current behavior.”
“We’re not just going to keep lifting your credit card limit, right,” he added. “And we should seriously sit together and [figure out] where can we eliminate some waste? Where can we make the economy grow stronger?”
Pressed on whether changes to the entitlement programs such as Medicare and Social Security were part of the debt ceiling discussions, McCarthy said he would not “predetermine” anything.
The debt limit — the country’s borrowing cap — will need to be lifted next year to protect the country’s credit score and to prevent the United States from defaulting on its debt. But McCarthy suggested that his party would be willing to hold the debt limit up for policy changes.
The debt limit is the total amount of money that the government is authorized to borrow to meet its existing legal obligations, including Social Security and Medicare benefits, military salaries, interest on the national debt, tax refunds and other payments. The debt limit is not new spending but rather allows the government to finance existing legal obligations.
Congress raised the debt ceiling three times when Donald Trump was president, avoiding the market-rattling, economic showdowns that congressional Republicans had forced when Democratic President Barack Obama was in office. During the Trump presidency, and for a time when Republicans controlled at least one chamber of Congress, the debt soared to $7 trillion.
McCarthy is not the first Republican to say he is open to changes in the entitlement programs. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) has suggested that Social Security and Medicare be eliminated as federal entitlement programs, and that they should instead become programs approved by Congress on an annual basis as discretionary spending.
Those who work in the United States pay Social Security and Medicare taxes that go into federal trust funds. Upon retirement, based on a person’s lifetime earnings and other factors, a retiree is eligible to receive monthly Social Security payments. Similarly, Medicare is the federal health insurance program that kicks in for people 65 and older, or for others who have disabilities.
In an interview in August, Johnson, who is seeking a third term in the Senate, lamented that the Social Security and Medicare programs automatically grant benefits to those who meet the qualifications — that is, to those who had been paying into the system over their working life.
“If you qualify for the entitlement, you just get it no matter what the cost,” Johnson said. “And our problem in this country is that more than 70 percent of our federal budget, of our federal spending, is all mandatory spending. It’s on automatic pilot. It never — you just don’t do proper oversight. You don’t get in there and fix the programs going bankrupt. It’s just on automatic pilot.”
Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) has proposed to “sunset” all federal programs after five years, meaning they would expire unless renewed. “If a law is worth keeping, Congress can pass it again,” Scott says in his proposal .
Concerns about government spending are a frequent Republican talking point when Democrats control the White House. Prior to McCarthy accusing congressional Democrats and President Biden of spending too much money, former House speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) complained about spending during the Obama presidency.
McCarthy also signaled that additional aid to Ukraine, now in the eighth month of war with Russia, is unlikely if Republicans have a House majority. To date, Congress has provided more than $60 billion to the Eastern European country fighting off an invasion from Russia, with strong bipartisan votes.
McCarthy suggested maintaining that support could be difficult.
“I think people are gonna be sitting in a recession, and they’re not going to write a blank check to Ukraine,” McCarthy said. “They just won’t do it.”
The Republican suggested GOP voters would like to see U.S. dollars addressing issues closer to home.
“There’s the things [the Biden administration] is not doing domestically,” McCarthy said. “Not doing the border and people begin to weigh that. Ukraine is important, but at the same time it can’t be the only thing they do, and it can’t be a blank check.”
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Its hard to imagine the scenario where threatening to make social security "discretionary" will get the GOP any new voters, but maybe they just presume their voters are so into owning the libs that they wont care.
I am getting to the point that let them screw up their own lives, problem being, they screw up everyone else's lives in the process...
He is now saying that they need to sit down and figure cuts....
Why in the hell hasn't he or they been doing that all along?
He is basically saying they want cuts, just never bothered to figure out where....Which in my mind reads that he is just spouting off at the mouth in what he thinks will get republicans votes.
They only thing they seem to want to target for cuts is domestic welfare spending.
They will find some way to blame the other side.
If the debt limit has to be increased this much, there are much needed spending cuts. I recommend stop using Medicare and Social Security as a slush fund. The money sent to Ukraine shouldn't have went out at all.
THIS is why Fetterman will sneak past his past and into the Senate. Boomers don't want to hear that austerity shit now that they're the ones at Shady Pines.
It's October and Democrats are scared. Start the "republicans are going to cut social security" fear mongering.
Play the hits.. Will Democrats be running ads of mitt Romney trying to kill old women again?
Or at least provide a cite to a bill that Republicans have passed cutting social security in one of the many sessions they controlled a House of Congress this century?
The problem is the likes of Rick Scott who have SAID they want to trim Social Security - and we know that's just a cute word for 'gut'. There are entitlement blocs that can use a shave but going after the old farts - the people who vote - isn't a career move.
The current behavior is unsustainable. It's going to change one way or another.
Democrats are all for the "another" way.
They will be blaming Trump and Republicans until the very bitter end as the system collapses around their ears.
Lets start by cutting the defense budget in half.
Riiiiiight.
Because the great depression was so much fun, let's do a bigger one.
So America will collapse unless we keep feeding companies who make weapons of war.
That is what you are saying. Why not take some of that money and pay companies to create affordable housing.
Dont complain about the national debt when we spend almost a trillion dollars on the military every year.
If we cut half the defense budget? Absolutely.
Why don't we think about ideas that aren't completely stupid and melodramatic.
What about a 3% cut?
How about coupling that with a 2% cut in Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement rates?
Prudent management will involve small cuts to a lot of areas.
Since the 2023 defense budget is a 9% increase over 2022 why wasn't that simply held at the 2022 levels?
Probably because everything costs 9% more than it did a year ago.
If he want's a saving that would be a place to start.
I think it's fair to have everything on the table, including defense, social security, Medicare, and Medicaid.
It's a bit idiotic to think we're going to be able to manage anything if 70% of the budget is off limits.
There isn't a Defense Budget yet for FY23. DoD is currently operating under a Continuing Resolution (a temporary appropriation, pegged to expire in mid-Dec). Under a CR, the Services can't exceed equivalent spending levels for critical operations and can't exceed 80% for most operations from the previous year, no new projects or program starts and reduced civilian hires.
And with that contractors are being brought in.
Yes, the stop gap until FY 2023 is passed.