10.10.23

Grassley Doubles Down on Calls for Fiscal Sanity as U.S. Deficit Balloons under Biden

BUTLER COUNTY, IOWA – The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) today published a report showing the U.S. deficit for Fiscal Year 2023 is $1.7 trillion, prompting Senate Budget Committee Ranking Member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) to amplify his calls for fiscal sanity.

“At the rate this administration is burning through taxpayer cash and borrowing money, Americans will be paying off Biden-era economic decisions for generations. The president must shift gears and start cutting costs,” Grassley said.

The 2023 deficit of $1.7 trillion is 76 percent greater than the CBO had projected it would be when President Biden took office. Absent an accounting anomaly stemming from the Biden administration’s failed attempt to ram through its unconstitutional student debt transfer plan, the recorded deficit would have been over $2 trillion. Grassley pushed back against President Biden’s new student debt transfer scheme this morning. 

Further, federal borrowing costs are now at a 16-year high. Not only is this fueling today’s unprecedented debt and deficit levels, but it was also a primary contributor to the 33 percent rise in net outlays for interest on public debt. This is in large part due to Bidenomics and congressional Democrat spending sprees. In early 2021, when interest rates sat at a record low, Office of Management and Budget Director Shalanda Young even claimed it would be a “historic missed opportunity” to forego borrowing trillions of dollars. 

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