Although Republicans have sometimes dominated the debate over efforts to reduce deficits and the debt, the Biden administration thinks it may have gained the upper hand on the issue – and looks forward to exploiting its potential advantage in what could be a brutal battle over the 2024 budget this fall.
In a memo to supporters Tuesday, deputy White House press secretary Andrew Bates argued that voters prefer Biden’s plans for raising revenues and reducing outlays – which include income tax increases on the very wealthy, higher corporate taxes and federal negotiation of lower drug prices – to Republican proposals that focus on tax cuts and slashing spending.
“Congressional Republicans keep indicating they want to talk about deficits. Not as much as we do,” Bates said, per Politico.
Bates said that GOP proposals amount to “deficit-increasing tax welfare skewed to wealthy people and large corporations that adds trillions to the debt,” with savings achieved only by reducing benefits in popular programs including Medicare and Social Security.
Noting that “congressional Republicans claim to be champing at the bit to have a debate about deficits,” Bates said Democrats would be happy to highlight GOP “plans to eviscerate Medicare and Social Security benefits while spending trillions on tax handouts to the rich and big corporations, and force seniors to pay even higher drug costs so Big Pharma can fill more swimming pools with caviar and diamonds. We’ll book them on TV ourselves if it’s helpful!”
