David Price: “I want to suggest five reasons why our colleagues should vote against this Republican budget resolution. The first…”

“I want to suggest five reasons why our colleagues should vote against this Republican budget resolution. The first reason is that it contains indiscriminate and risky tax cuts that, under realistic assumptions about defense and nondefense spending, will take up more than the available non-Social Security surplus over the next 5 years. The tax cut in this budget resolution, $175 billion over 5 years, exceeds the total non-Social Security surplus forecast by the Congressional Budget Office under an assumption of discretionary spending frozen at inflation-adjusted levels. Reason number two, it proposes to significantly undercut nondefense discretionary programs that Americans depend on. Over 5 years, the Republican plan would cut nondefense programs by $122 billion below inflation adjusted levels. That would mean, for example, Pell grants for 316,000 fewer students. It would eliminate Head Start for more than 40,000 children. Reason number three, the Republican plan does nothing to extend the solvency of Medicare and Social Security. We ought to be using a portion of our surpluses to extend the solvency of these programs, which would have the important added benefit of locking in additional debt reduction. Reason number four, under the Republican budget resolution's unrealistic spending targets, we are once again headed toward an end-of-the-session train wreck and efforts to circumvent the budget process through new and improved gimmicks.”