Over a month ago the Republican majority in the House of Representatives passed the Limit, Save, Grow Act to modestly increase the debt ceiling while reducing spending and the
drivers of future spending. To the surprise of conservative sceptics, Speaker McCarthy, unlike past GOP congressional leaders, continues to pressure President Biden to do what is right for the American people and agree to the sensible provisions in the bill that would resolve the debt ceiling impasse.
In contrast to the Republican bill passed well in advance of the date of any potential default, President Biden and Democrats have been dragging their feet for weeks threatening the chaos of a default to fight for rich liberal elitists who want more spending, more government, more corporate subsidies, and less freedom.
In a memo to Republican House Members shared exclusively with CHQ and other conservative thought leaders, principled limited government constitutional Republican Rep. Chip Roy (TX-21) spelled out the reforms the House passed in the Limit, Save, Grow Act.
Reform #1: Reduce FY 2024 discretionary spending to FY 2022 levels and cap future spending at 1% growth to cut the deficit and rein in the federal bureaucracy.
This would cut $131 billion in discretionary spending in year one, save $3.6 trillion over a decade, and – most importantly – restrict the federal bureaucracy’s power to interfere with Americans’ ability to live free an prosper economically.
• Failure to Carry Through: Means continued expansive funding without constraint of the federal bureaucracy at odds with Americans.
• False Criticism: This will crush defense spending!
o Reality: We could meet the FY 2024 cap ($1.471 trillion), while preserving at least the FY 2023 defense funding level ($858 billion) by cutting nondefense discretionary (NDD) funding to pre-COVID levels ($597 billion).
o Defense has plenty of waste to cut and GOP “hawks” need to remember guns vs. butter.
• False Criticism: Nondefense spending will be gutted!
o Reality: We could also meet the FY 2024 cap and fund NDD at the exact same level “MAGA Extremist” Barack Obama proposed for FY 2024 in his last budget ($613BB).
o President Obama’s final budget also estimated NDD outlays would total 2.6% of GDP in 2024, but CBO’s current baseline now projects it at 3.7% of GDP in 2024.
• False Criticism: These cuts are very unpopular!
o Reality: 92% of Americans think it is important to balance the federal budget.
o 74% of Americans support reducing funding to pre-pandemic levels.
Reform #2: Repeal the grid-destroying tax credits for unreliable energy in the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act” that will benefit rich liberals, corporations, and the CCP.
Last year – through the use of reconciliation, with 158 proxy votes, and on a party line vote in August – Democrats jammed through a giant giveaway to the rich. Goldman Sachs estimated the IRA’s unreliable energy subsidies and programs will cost up to $1.2 trillion – over three times the original estimate of $391 billion.
• Failure to Carry Through: Means the absolute decimation of our grid to the benefit of corporate cronies – EIA estimates that the IRA could make wind and solar account for nearly 60% of US electricity generation by 2050, knocking off reliable generation in the process.
o According to EIA, wind and solar made up just 12% of US generation in 2021.
o In many cases, the places with the most wind and solar on the grid tend to have the highest electricity costs.
• False Criticism: Republicans just want to preserve tax cuts for the rich!
o Reality: 78% of the electric vehicle tax credit is claimed by filers making $100K or more per year – couples making up to $300K per year can get these subsidies.
o Over 90% of green energy tax subsidies go to corporations that make over $1 billion per year and financial institutions receive three times the benefit from the credits than other industries.
• False Criticism: This will make us less competitive with China!
o Reality: Chinese companies are eligible for these climate credits – a recent analysis found Chinese companies could end up with $125 billion in IRA subsidies.
Reform #3: Overturn Biden’s unfair, deficit increasing, and tuition increasing student loan bailout – which will cut the deficit by $400 billion this fiscal year.
Biden carried out his unfair, deficit and tuition increasing student loan bailout unilaterally via executive action. CBO estimates that overturning Biden’s action would cut the deficit by nearly $400 billion this fiscal year.
• Failure to Carry Through: Means a veteran will have to watch someone who did not sacrifice for this country get the same benefits he does under the GI Bill and a plumber without a degree will have to subsidize his neighbor’s master’s degree in gender studies.
• False Criticism: This will drive up the cost of tuition!
o Reality: The Federal Reserve “found that the average tuition increase associated with expansion of student loans is as much as 60 cents per dollar.”
• False Criticism: Overturning this hurts the average American!
o Reality: According to the Brookings Institution, households with graduate degrees held 56% of outstanding education debt in 2019.
o In fact, 87% of Americans do not have federal student loan debt.
• False Criticism: The president has the authority to do this!
o Reality: In June 2021, Speaker Pelosi herself said, “People think the president of the United States has the power for debt forgiveness. He does not. He can postpone, he can delay, but he does not have that power. That has to be an act of Congress.”
Reform #4: Rescind the $80 billion Democrats gave to the IRS to hire 87,000 agents that will target working- and middle-class taxpayers the most.
Recouping these funds will not only save billions in inflationary spending right now, it also reduces the size of a weaponized agency and protects hardworking American families and businesses.
• Failure to Carry Through: Means the supercharged IRS will continue to target working families that cannot afford a high dollar accountant or tax lawyer.
• False Criticism: Republicans just want to protect rich tax cheats!
o Reality: According to CBS, the “IRS audits the poor at 5 times the rate of everyone else…”
o According to the New York Times, “Black taxpayers are at least three times as likely to be audited by the Internal Revenue Service as other taxpayers…”
Reform #5: Implement the REINS Act to end the abuse of executive power by empowering Congress to approve major regulations that cost Americans billions of dollars.
President Biden’s regulatory deluge in his first two years has saddled the American people with “$318 billion in total costs and more than 218 million hours of paperwork.”
• Failure to Carry Through: Means the American people will continue to be subjected to the most aggressive regulatory regime in recent history and hundreds of billions in additional costs.
• False Criticism: This is a Republican power grab!
o Reality: This is a bipartisan proposal that impacts every administration, regardless of party, equally - the REINS Act passed the House on a bipartisan basis in 2017.
Reform #6: Strengthen and establish work requirements for able bodied Americans that are receiving government assistance – just like President Biden supported.
After $5 trillion in COVID spending and two years of Democrats paying people not to work, our labor force participation rate is well below pre-pandemic levels and the federal government continues to undermine the dignity of work through assistance programs.
• Failure to Carry Through: Means turning our back on the dignity of work and a slap in the face to Americans that work hard to make ends meet.
• False Criticism: These are draconian and uncompassionate reforms!
o Reality: Our reforms are based on the 1996 welfare reforms that then-Senator Biden supported under President Clinton.
o Biden said of the reforms at the time: “The culture of welfare must be replaced with the culture of work…The culture of dependence must be replaced with the culture of self-sufficiency and personal responsibility. And, the culture of permanence must no longer be a way of life.”
• False Criticism: “All these people are working anyway.”
o Reality: If that’s the case, then why oppose even the most basic work requirements for able bodied adults without dependent children?
Reform #7: Reclaim billions in unobligated COVID spending – President Biden himself has signed legislation to end the COVID emergency.
The $5 trillion we dumped into the economy in the name of “COVID” was one of the main drivers of inflation. COVID is long over, it is time to reclaim the tens of billions of unobligated COVID funding that still remains.
• Failure To Carry Through: Means an abject failure to demonstrate to the American people that we are willing to fight for even the most basic and popular spending cut.
• False Criticism: These funds are necessary to combat the impacts of COVID!
o Reality: In September 2022, President Biden said on 60 Minutes, “The pandemic is over.”
o In April 2023, Biden signed Rep. Paul Gosar’s resolution terminating the COVID national emergency.
The Capitol Switchboard is (202-224-3121) we urge CHQ readers and friends to call Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy and Republican Representatives. Tell them to #HoldTheLine on the House-passed Limit, Save, Grow Act to bring federal spending into line with federal tax collections and to stave-off any risk of federal default.
2024 Republican primary race
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Mitch McConnell
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Mike Lee Letter
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Limit, Save, Grow Act
Rep. Chip Roy (TX-21)
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