Data: Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget; Chart: Axios Visuals
Former President Trump ranup the national debt by about twice as much as President Biden, according to a new analysis of their fiscal track records.
Why it matters: The winner of November’s election faces a gloomy fiscal outlook, with rapidly rising debt levels at a time when interest rates are already high and demographic pressure on retirement programs is rising.
Both candidates bear a share of the responsibility, as each added trillions to that tally while in office.
But Trump’s contribution was significantly higher, according to the fiscal watchdogs at the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, thanks to both tax cuts and spending deals struck in his four years in the White House.
By the numbers: Trump added $8.4 trillion in borrowing over a ten-year window, CRFB finds in a report out this morning.
Biden’s figure clocks in at $4.3 trillion with seven months remaining in his term.
If you exclude COVID relief spending from the tally, the numbers are $4.8 trillion for Trump and $2.2 trillion for Biden.
State of play: For Trump, the biggest non-COVID drivers of higher public debt were his signature tax cuts enacted in 2017 (causing $1.9 trillion in additional borrowing) and bipartisan spending packages (which added $2.1 trillion).
For Biden, major non-COVID factors include 2022 and 2023 spending bills ($1.4 trillion), student debt relief ($620 billion), and legislation to support health care for veterans ($520 billion).
Biden deficits have also swelled, according to CRFB’s analysis, due to executive actions that changed the way food stamp benefits are calculated, expanding Medicaid benefits, and other changes that total $548 billion.
Between the lines: Deficit politics may return to the forefront of U.S. policy debates next year.
Much of Trump’s tax law is set to expire at the end of 2025, and the CBO has estimated that fully extending it would increase deficits by $4.6 trillion over the next decade.
High interest rates make the taxpayer burden of both existing and new debt higher than it was during the era of near-zero interest rates.
And the Social Security trust fund is rapidly hurtling toward depletion in 2033, which would trigger huge cuts in the retirement benefits absent Congressional action.
What they’re saying: “The next president will face huge fiscal challenges,” CRFB president Maya MacGuineas tells Axios.
“Yet both candidates have track records of approving trillions in new borrowing even setting aside the justified borrowing for COVID, and neither has proposed a comprehensive and credible plan to get the debt under control,” she said.
“No president is fully responsible for the fiscal challenges that come along, but they need to use the bully pulpit to set the stage for making some hard choices,” MacGuineas said.
A Texas law that banned abortions in early pregnancy is associated with a stark increase in infant and newborn deaths, a study published Monday in JAMA Pediatrics found.
Lawmakers passed Texas Senate Bill 8, or SB8, in September 2021. The state law banned abortions as soon as a fetal heartbeat is detected, which can be as early as five weeks. This effectively banned abortion in the state, which used to allow abortion up to 22 weeks of pregnancy.
The law did not include exemptions for congenital anomalies, including conditions that will cause a newborn to die soon after birth. Infant deaths in Texas rose by nearly 13% the year after SB8 was passed, from 1,985 in 2021 to 2,240 in 2022. During that same period, infant deaths rose by about 2% nationwide.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s office did not dispute the study’s findings but defended the Republican-controlled state’s anti-abortion record. This effort included the 2021 heartbeat law “to save the innocent unborn, and now thousands of children have been given a chance at life,” Andrew Mahaleris, a spokesperson for Abbott, said in a statement to USA TODAY.
He said the governor has taken “significant action to protect the sanctity of life” and offered resources to expectant mothers “so they can choose life for their child.”
Anti-abortion advocates also didn’t contest the uptick in infant deaths cited in the study. Advocates for the heartbeat law and other legislation to restrict abortions say such bans protect life. They say terminating a fetus with a terminal illness is “choosing to kill that child intentionally.” However, the overwhelming majority of such abortions happen before the fetus is viable.
New: Infant deaths rose after Texas’ 2021 heartbeat law restricted abortions before the SCOTUS Dobbs decision two years ago, per a JAMA Pediatrics study published today out of @JohnsHopkinsSPH. Texas anti-abortion activists don’t dispute the findings. https://t.co/xeNpxrNk1n
Brilliant! This reinforces my assertion that pro-lifers prioritize fetal life above all life on earth. From a theological perspective, they need to be continually challenged on that but never are.
The religious right Republicans don’t give a hoot about the child/infant. It’s all about control. Once the birth has occurred, they quickly forget about the individual. Republicans seek to stop benefits for the poor, provide little to no education unless it is religion based, Let’s not forget about the abundance of guns that can whip out whole classrooms of children and the death penalty. Need I say more?
In 2020 and 2021, amid a pandemic that wreaked general havoc on the social fabric of the United States, violent crime rose. Today, most Americans believe that crime in the US has come roaring back — maybe even to the levels of the 1980s and ’90s.
But a look at the data shows a very different story. Nevertheless, the feeling that our cities are less safe is at least partly coming from something real. Something has changed in American cities, particularly since the pandemic. So what’s different, and what is the truth about crime in America right now?
Watch as GreaterSapien, usually the voice of reason, loses his grip while discussing Donald Trump and the MAGA movement! This video can’t mask the underlying meltdown as he rants against Trump’s policies and MAGA’s influence with shaking fury. From calling Trump the “titanic of presidents” to labeling MAGA hats as “brain cell repellents,” GreaterSapien pulls no punches in this comically exaggerated takedown. It’s all absurdly civil on the surface, but the subtext screams satire! Come for the supposed meltdown, stay for the clever critiques. #UnhingedLogic#TrumpTirade#MAGAchaos
Scottie's Playtime 