Biggs Warns Biden, Dems Putting US Nat'l Security at Risk with New $6 Trillion Spending Plan
Republican Freedom Caucus Chairman Rep. Andy Biggs of Arizona is raising the red flag about the dangerous national security implications of the new spending being sought by the Biden administration and the Democratic-controlled Congress.
Biggs highlighted in a Tuesday interview with Tea Party Patriots Action Honorary Chairman Jenny Beth Martin that past secretaries of defense, from both parties, and chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff all agree that massive deficit spending is the “top security threat to this country.”
The New York Times reported, “President Biden will propose a $6 trillion budget on Friday that would take the United States to its highest sustained levels of federal spending since World War II as he looks to fund a sweeping economic agenda that includes large new investments in education, transportation and fighting climate change.”
“Under Mr. Biden’s proposal, the federal budget deficit would hit $1.8 trillion in 2022, even as the economy rebounds from the pandemic recession,” the outlet added. “By 2024, debt as a share of the economy would rise to its highest level in American history, eclipsing a World War II-era record.”
The deficit was a record $3.1 trillion in 2020, while the Congressional Budget Office estimates for the current fiscal year 2021 it will be $2.3 trillion. In 2019, it was $984 billion.
Earlier this month, Biggs introduced House Resolution 417, co-sponsored by 26 House members, “[r]ecognizing the national debt as a threat to national security.”
‘His resolution recognizes that deficits are unsustainable, irresponsible, and dangerous,’ reads a news release from Congressman Andy Biggs. https://t.co/FQYpzV3ig0
— The Western Journal (@WestJournalism) May 21, 2021
The resolution notes that more than $7 trillion of the nation’s over $28 trillion in debt is held by people outside of the United States, including greater than $1 trillion owned by individuals in China.
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“Our debt to revenue ratio is about 143 percent,” Biggs told Martin. “Greece fell at 118 percent. And I think most astute people would say about 115 percent to 120 percent, you’re bankrupt.”
“The only things that were really saving us through like the COVID was energy independence, and we’re the international currency of exchange,” he added.
“It’s a dangerous and reckless threat to our security and our future.”
The congressman elaborated on the adverse impact of deficit spending on military preparedness over time.
The interest payment alone on the current national debt will be at $400 billion this year, Biggs said, and then pointed out that the entire Defense Department budget will be between $750 billion and $800 billion.
He predicted if the current spending trajectory continues, in five years the interest payment on the national debt alone will equal the defense budget, which is the largest single discretionary spending item.
“You lose the ability to spend anywhere else in your budget because your interest is eating up so much,” Biggs said.
“Let’s say you have an adversary that’s making a move and you have got to do either research and development or you gotta stand up in a hurry, you don’t have the capacity to do that anymore.”
As the Congressional Budget Office charts below show, mandatory entitlements — Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, etc. — drive the majority of federal spending each year.
In 2019 prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, total federal spending was $4.4 trillion, which grew $6.6 trillion last year.
As noted above, Biden only wants to bring spending back down to $6 trillion in 2022, while greatly increasing the entitlement spending.
The CBO’s federal budget charts, comparing 2019 to 2020 spending allocations. https://t.co/9jikvffWD3 pic.twitter.com/nBo0E3Kg9z
— Randy DeSoto (@RandyDeSoto) May 27, 2021
“We view this as an existential moment in our country and the direction it’s going to go,” Biggs said.
“Are we going to go further to control and Marxian type of government, or are we going to remain a free and independent United States?”
