Bob Menendez: “the Nation's $2.6 trillion budget was filed just over 3 hours ago, and we have not even had a chance to review it. But…”

“the Nation's $2.6 trillion budget was filed just over 3 hours ago, and we have not even had a chance to review it. But from press reports this budget adds more than $4 trillion to the deficit in the next 10 years without even including the enormous costs that have been left out of the budget such as funding for continued military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. So let us be clear that when Members come to the floor representing their constituencies, they should understand that a vote for this budget resolution is a vote to increase the debt ceiling of the United States to $8.6 trillion. This will ensure that our tax dollars do not go to Social Security and Medicare or to investing in our people, but to simply paying interest on this debt that Republicans continue to raise without any concern about future generations. By not restoring the budget enforcement rules, the rules that say we have to pay for the expenditures of the Nation as we go, they continue to spend wildly, making tax cuts for the wealthy permanent, and driving us and the deficit into deeper debt, a debt that will not educate one child, provide lifesaving health care to someone who needs it, or treat and care for those veterans that are returning from war. This budget only guarantees that the middle class will be further squeezed.…”