The White House blamed congressional Republicans on Wednesday for the national debt surpassing $34,000,000,000,000 for the first time in the nation’s history.
The attempt to shift blame to Republicans absolves President Joe Biden’s leadership while justifying his massive spending policies throughout his 35-month tenure:
- 2021: $1.9 trillion coronavirus rescue package
- 2021: $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill
- 2022: $12 billion in Ukraine aid
- 2022: $3 billion for facilitating Afghan refugees to the United States
Though Biden signed the massive spending bills into law, many of the bills were supported by Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who pushed fellow Republicans to vote for the infrastructure, Ukraine, and Afghan bills.
“If you think about it, Republican tax cuts are responsible [for] about 90 percent of it — of the increase in the debt as a share of the economy over the last two decades, excluding emergency spending,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre replied during a press briefing when asked about the record high debt.
“What they’ve [Republicans] tried to do is continue to give a tax break to the millionaires and the billionaires and that — what they have actually put forward would add more than $3 trillion to the debt,” Jean-Pierre continued. “So that’s what that data shows us.”
Karine Jean-Pierre Biden has actually cut the record $34 trillion national debt (he hasn't) pic.twitter.com/0nhW7FG5Od
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) January 3, 2024
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said Wednesday that much of the outrageous spending must stop and that curtailing the southern border invasion must come before any taxpayer money is spent to defend Ukraine’s eastern border.
“That’s the message: we have [sic] to secure the border before we can take care of anything else,” he told Larry Kudlow on Fox Business.
“National security, the sovereignty of our nation, is the most important,” Johnson said. “And secondly, Larry, as you and I both know, we talk about all the time we have to limit discretionary spending, non-defense items we’re trying to reduce, as you know widely reported we’re $34 trillion in debt today,” he continued. “We take that very seriously in the Republican conference.”
Follow Wendell Husebø on “X” @WendellHusebø. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality.
