Washington, Feb 11 (IANS) The Democrat-controlled House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi has harshly criticized the White House’s budget proposal for the next fiscal year, saying that it was “a complete reversal” of the promises President Donald Trump made in the campaign.
“Once again, the President is showing just how little he values the good health, financial security and well-being of hard-working American families,” Xinhua news agency quoted Pelosi as saying in a statement on Monday.
“The President’s budget is anti-growth, does not create good-paying jobs and increases the national debt.”
Pelosi said the plan slashes half a trillion dollars from Medicare, takes $900 billion from the lifeline of Medicaid, and cuts social security disability insurance.
She also accused the administration of “hurting students”, by trimming federal student loan initiatives, among other things, “abandoning farmers and hungry families by shaving money from the farmer safety net and nutrition assistance programme, and “cutting investments in jobs and the future of our communities”.
The California Democrat again criticized the Trump administration’s tax cuts, saying that the budget extends the Republican “tax scam for the rich”.
According to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a non-partisan watchdog group, the extension of the individual income tax cuts beyond 2025 expiration would add $1.5 trillion to the national debt.
Earlier on Monday, the White House unveiled a budget proposal for next fiscal year that would cut major domestic programmes, claiming that solid economic growth would support substantial deficit reduction and lead to a balanced budget by 2035.
The budget for fiscal year 2021, which runs from October this year through September 2021, projects federal deficit will hit $1 trillion for current fiscal year and hover above $200 billion after a decade, accounting for 4.9 per cent and 0.7 per cent of the GDP respectively.
The watchdog group said the budget relies on “overly optimistic” economic assumptions and “budget gimmicks that inflate its savings and distract from its actual policy reforms”.
–IANS
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