REAX of Senate Appropriations Committee Vice Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) To the Bipartisan Budget Agreement Reached Between Congress and The President
A budget is where we set our priorities as a nation, and President Trump’s annual budget proposals have shown time and again that his administration’s priority is to slash investments here at home for American families and pour money into an ineffective wall along our Southern Border. Today’s bipartisan budget agreement once again rejects the shortsighted priorities of the Trump administration for the real priorities of the American people.
This agreement will build upon the 2018 bipartisan budget agreement that reversed unsustainable cuts in non-defense discretionary spending. It will bring an end to sequestration and wipe out the 11 percent sequester on non-defense and defense spending the 2011 law would have required, which would have had devastating consequences for American families, for American communities, and for our military. It will allow us to continue to make new investments in child care, combating the opioid epidemic, infrastructure and American communities. Also importantly, it will raise the debt limit for the next two years and stave off economic catastrophe. I will support the bill.
I understand there is a statement of principles between congressional leaders and the White House, and I have many concerns with its content. The powers of the Appropriations Committee and Congress’s power of the purse are enshrined in the Constitution, and as Vice Chairman of this Committee I will defend its constitutional role.
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