Wagner Statement on Fiscal Responsibility Act

Washington, D.C.  – Congresswoman Ann Wagner, Chair of the Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets, released the following statement on the Fiscal Responsibility Act: 

“Make no mistake, this is the largest spending cut in history, over $2 trillion.  The President started by asking for a blank check and new credit card.  Speaker McCarthy was able to get him to negotiate a good first step toward getting our spending under control.  We now need a Republican Senate and President to take the next steps.

“This deal closes loopholes and increases work requirements on welfare programs to get able-bodied Americans back in the workforce – promoting a healthy tax base and restoring the dignity of self-sufficiency.  It increases defense spending by 3.5% and protects funding for veterans, while implementing an immediate 11% cut on the bloated federal bureaucracy and clawing back the remaining $30 billion in unspent COVID funds.  We are also repurposing $20 billion of funding for Nancy Pelosi’s IRS agents to further protect American taxpayers from unnecessary government overreach. 

“This is just a warm-up. Congress will continue to fight to save taxpayers even more money every single year.  Thanks to House Republicans the full faith and credit of the United States remains strong. The U.S. has never defaulted on its debt, and it won’t today.”

Background

• Enacts the largest spending cut in history, over $2 trillion, as well as the largest rescissions package in history, almost $30 billion. It sets us on the path to enact even more spending cuts down the line through the annual appropriations and budget process.
• Closes loopholes and increases work requirements on welfare programs to get able-bodied Americans back in the workforce – promoting a healthy tax base and restoring the dignity of self-sufficiency.
• Ends Biden’s pause on student loan payments, saving taxpayers $5 billion per month and putting a stop to this blatantly unfair action that offers payouts to high-earning professionals at the expense of hardworking, middle-class families.
• Claws back tens of billions in unspent COVID money.
• Rescinds money Speaker Pelosi allocated to hire an army of new IRS agents.
• Totally overhauls the EPA’s burdensome regulatory regime that is stifling American energy production.
• Ends EPA’s ability to kill gas and oil projects through unending environmental reviews, setting a two-year maximum time frame for the review process, and establishes a private right of action for energy companies if the EPA blows its deadline.
• For the first time ever, codifies a Trump policy that requires the executive branch to pay for its spending with matching cuts. This provision would have prevented the Biden Administration from adding another $1.5 trillion to the national debt in the last two and a half years alone.
• Automatically cuts spending by a further 1% (more than $15 billion every year) if Congress doesn’t pass all 12 spending bills on time.
• Kills the President’s attempt to blow up the deal by adding trillions in new taxes and costly new programs. House Republicans forced the President to negotiate on our terms, within the limits of our Limit, Save, Grow Act.