Jacob Ogles
At a conference headlined by U.S. Sen. Rick Scott, the Naples Republican made clear the Senate wants a much thriftier budget.
Scott compared the challenge of reining in federal spending to when he won the election as Florida Governor in 2010 and found resistance to fiscal restraint in Tallahassee. He said Florida was four months from default when he took office.
“Everybody says all these states all balance our budgets. That’s from pure BS,” he said. “some states have to balance our budget, and some states have voluntarily balanced the budget. But most states, what they do is they don’t balance their budget. Even though it says you’re supposed to have a balanced budget, you balance your budget by borrowing money.”
He said Florida had increased its net debt for over $1 billion for 20 straight years, a period that notably covers the administration of Republican Gov. Jeb Bush and then-Republican Gov. Charlie Crist (who became an independent for most of his last year in office). Scott said he brought a businessman’s perspective to the Governor’s mansion.
The comments came as the House and Senate remain far apart in negotiating a federal budget. Scott moderated a panel on budget reconciliation at a summit organized by Rescuing the American Dream.
Republican U.S. Sens. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and Roger Marshall of Kansas joined Scott on the stage, stressing the need to restore federal spending to pre-pandemic levels.
Johnson complained that when he was elected to the Senate in 2016, he found most members of Congress didn’t even know the current level of spending. It was about $6.5 trillion at the time.
A push to reduce spending lowered that to about $4.4 trillion in 2019; spending then spiked after the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We had to do something pretty quick, pretty massive, so the markets wouldn’t collapse,” Johnson said. “But then we never stopped spending at that level the next five years.”
He said spending is on track to reach $6.9 trillion this year, and Congress needs to negotiate with the House to reduce the levels.
House Speaker Mike Johnson passed a House resolution in February that slashed spending by less than $2 trillion, according to The New York Times. Johnson said the spending should be cut much further.
Marshall said cutting spending is a more compassionate approach than continuing to grow welfare programs, and Republicans need to communicate why.
“We don’t do a good job as conservatives in showing what’s in our heart, that we would give the shirt off our backs to anybody that wants to help themselves,” he said.
But Scott also said that having just won re-election to a second term himself, few voters approached him on the trail calling for preserving government programs. He said most voters just want to be able to provide for themselves.
“I grew up in public housing. And I don’t remember getting a whole bunch of handouts. There was no food stamps. My mom got some food stamps. She got no welfare,” Scott said. “She actually told me if I ever went on a government program, she would be very disappointed.”
