
After Voting For Trillions In Debt, House Republicans Approve A $9 Billion Cut
HuffPost
It won’t fix the nation’s fiscal health, but it sure will help Republicans feel better about making it worse.
WASHINGTON — The House of Representatives on Thursday approved budget cuts proposed by the White House that would claw back funding for public broadcasters NPR and PBS, as well as foreign aid that Congress had previously approved on a bipartisan basis.
The measure passed 214 to 212 over howls from Democrats.
Republicans argue the $9.4 billion in spending cuts are necessary to address the nation’s mounting debt even though last month they passed a package of tax and spending cuts that could add an extra $3 trillion to the national debt over the next 10 years. The cuts passed Thursday, if approved by the Senate, would amount to less than a hundredth of a percent of projected federal spending for this year.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has touted the so-called rescissions package as a win for the Department of Government Efficiency, the effort previously headed by billionaire Elon Musk that dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development earlier this year without direct approval from Congress.
“This rescission package is a critical step, and it’s one of many,” Johnson said Tuesday. “There’ll be several of these that will come from the White House who work together with the administration to cut out all the fraud, waste and abuse.”