Donald Trump’s political career has been built on several myths. When it comes to the economy, Trump perpetuated a myth that he was a president who could grow the economy. The reality is that Trump spent his first term riding on the fumes of the Obama economy, and his second administration has disproven that part of his mythology.
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Trump also has claimed to be motivated to cut waste in government, but his budget proposal is loaded with outdated, wasteful spending for the Pentagon.
Trump has also claimed to be fiscally conservative, but his willingness to add debt and blow up the deficit tells a different story.
The Center For A Responsible Federal Budget took a look at Trump’s proposal and found:
The budget proposes to increase total defense funding to $1.5 trillion in FY 2027 – including $350 billion of funding in a new reconciliation bill and a $251 billion increase in base defense discretionary spending – partially offset by a purported $73 billion (10%) reduction in base nondefense discretionary spending.
The budget includes no official topline budgetary figures, but using its supplemental documents, we estimate that the budget reports to reduce debt to about 94% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by 2036 – compared to 120% of GDP in the Congressional Budget Office’s most recent baseline – largely by assuming 3% average annual real GDP growth over the decade.
The Trump budget is based on sunny growth projections that aren’t backed up by reality, but that is not the worst of it.