oil and gas facilities that the House bill would repeal. “Any threat to the IRA,” she said, referring to Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act, “is a threat to these factories and these jobs.”įred Krupp, president of the Environmental Defense Fund, called on lawmakers to maintain a charge on excessive methane emissions from U.S. Companies are also expanding their battery plants in states such as Oklahoma and Alabama, while wind-power manufacturing facilities are coming to Iowa, Georgia, Texas and others. She said that some 40 new electric battery manufacturing sites are coming to states such as Michigan, Arizona and South Carolina. Those tax breaks have spurred billions of dollars in private investment across the country, according to Abigail Ross Hopper, president and CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association. House Republicans propose rescinding most of the energy tax credits and spending in that bill, reducing deficits by more than $500 billion over 10 years. Two other witnesses called on lawmakers to keep provisions passed into law last August designed to curb global warming and boost clean energy production. “That sounds like good economic policy to me,” Lujan said. He said his participation in Head Start allowed him to learn, socialize and receive healthy food while his parents could stay in the workplace. Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., said he is one of two senators to have attended Head Start schooling, and warned that the House bill would eventually lead to dramatic cuts in that program. Such non-defense spending does not include mandatory funds for Medicare and Social Security. Such spending would fall to 2% of GDP by 2033, the lowest level since at least the early 1960s. He said the nation’s debt, now more than $31 trillion, means all legislative avenues should be open to addressing it.Įxcluding defense programs and veterans’ health benefits from the cuts when enacting future spending bills would put more pressure on other non-defense spending approved by Congress each year. It’s pretty easy.”īut that logic works both ways, some witnesses and Republican lawmakers said.īrian Riedl, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, told lawmakers that Congress has a long history of attaching efforts to reduce deficits to debt ceiling lifts. I could probably write the bill for them in five minutes. Budget Director Shalanda Young said, “Tomorrow, they could put a bill on the floor to make sure we won’t default. Meanwhile, the White House insisted anew Thursday that the onus is on Republicans in Congress to raise the debt limit. House Republicans care about the debt “sporadically,” he said, pointing to $7 trillion in debt that was added under President Donald Trump and $3 trillion under President George W. Sheldon Whitehouse, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, mocked that rationale. Republicans described the Democratic effort as a distraction that won’t change their position: Biden must negotiate on spending reductions in exchange for increasing the debt ceiling. Urgency around the issue intensified this week as the Treasury Department announced that the “extraordinary measures” being used to avoid a devastating government default could run out on June 1 - giving lawmakers just a few weeks to find a solution. It’s just the latest jousting in Congress over the debt limit, a legal limit to government borrowing that has been raised repeatedly in recent years as the nation’s debt has swelled past $31 trillion. “If Republicans won’t level with the American people about their terrible bill, Senate Democrats are going to do it for them,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said. That spending limit, which would account for most of the Republicans’ projected $4.8 trillion in savings, could have severe impacts on programs such as Head Start and Meals on Wheels, cancer research and veterans’ health care, Democrats say.
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