May 31, 2023
Permission to republish original opeds and cartoons granted.
Trump Up Big Over DeSantis with California Conservatives but DeSantis Has Slight Edge with Moderates
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McCarthy says debt deal ‘largest spending cut’ in history. Is he correct?
By Robert Romano
“Just confirmed by the non-partisan @USCBO… This will be the LARGEST SPENDING CUT that Congress has ever voted for in history. $2.13 Trillion!”
That was House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) in a May 30 Twitter post pointing to a newly generated Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimate of the Fiscal Responsibility Act legislation that increases the debt ceiling through 2024 and imposes spending caps currently being considered by Congress.
But is he correct? Are these the largest spending cuts in history?
One way to compare is as a percent of budget how it stacks up to the 2011 Budget Control Act, the previous largest spending caps ever imposed. At the time of passage, the Budget Control Act was projected by the CBO to reduce the deficit by $917 billion from 2012-2022: $741 billion from the discretionary spending caps or sequestration, $20 billion from reductions to mandatory spending and $156 billion as a result of less interest payments owed thanks to cutting spending.
The legislation also contemplated a further $1.2 trillion of cuts that would have been undertaken by a Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, but as these were non-binding on the committee and their recommendations non-binding on future Congresses, for the purposes of this analysis, these will be discounted.
By comparison, the 2023 Fiscal Responsibility Act imposes spending caps totaling a bit more than $1.5 trillion: $1.3 trillion by similar discretionary spending caps, $11 billion for rescissions and $188 billion for interest saved thanks to the cuts, according to CBO.
The 2023 legislation also contemplates, as did the Budget Control Act, future reductions to baseline discretionary spending for 2026 to 2029, totaling $552 billion of reductions to outlays, but as these are prospective and have not been implemented, and so for the purposes of this analysis, they will also be discounted.
So, on a nominal basis, the $1.5 trillion of spending caps in the 2023 bill is larger than the $917 billion in the 2011 bill. But what about as a percent of discretionary spending, excluding mandatory spending like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and so forth, and then as a percentage of the total budget, including mandatory spending?
At the time of passage of the 2011 Budget Control Act, discretionary spending outlays were projected to total almost $14.5 trillion from 2012 to 2021, making the $917 billion of discretionary spending caps and mandatory spending reductions about 6.3 percent of discretionary spending.
As for the 2023 Fiscal Responsibility Act, the $1.5 trillion of spending caps comparatively accounts for 7.2 percent of the projected discretionary spending of $21.2547 trillion from 2024 to 2033. So, objectively, the 2023 cuts are larger than the 2011 cuts as a percent of discretionary spending at the time of passage, apples to apples, discounting future promised cuts in both pieces of legislation that were contemplated.
But what about when Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and other mandatory spending set forth by statute based on individual qualification for benefits are included in the analysis?
Here, the 2011 Budget Control Act’s $917 billion of spending caps out of $47.3 trillion of then-expected outlays projected by the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) from 2012 to 2021 come in at 1.93 percent of the total budget.
And the 2023 Fiscal Responsibility Act’s $1.5 trillion of spending caps out of the now-expected $80.39 trillion of outlays by OMB, or 1.88 percent of the total budget.
So, even though the 2023 bill cuts more both nominally and as a percentage of discretionary spending than 2011, it cuts slightly less when taken as a percentage of the total budget. Therefore, the 2011 Budget Control Act actually cut slightly more out of the total budget than does the 2023 legislation.
The largest reason for that is that mandatory spending including Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and so forth is set to take on an ever larger portion of total federal spending, with Social Security and Medicare being the largest current drivers as the Baby Boomer retirement wave continues en masse.
Whereas, in 2011, mandatory spending plus interest accounted for $2.38 trillion out of $3.77 trillion, or 63.1 percent of total spending.
In 2023, mandatory spending plus interest, $4.6 trillion out of $6.37 trillion, constitutes 72.7 percent of total spending.
And by 2033, mandatory spending plus interest, $7.75 trillion out of $9.95 trillion, will constitute a whopping 77.9 percent of total spending as the national debt is expected to swell from $31.4 trillion to today to a gargantuan $50.7 trillion by 2033. The Fiscal Responsibility Act appears that it would reduce the debt by 2033 to about $49.2 trillion instead of $50.7 trillion, barely scratching the surface. Maybe it buys a year? A few months?
Meaning, every decade that goes by, there is less and less that can be accomplished by Congress using discretionary spending caps alone. So, yes, the Fiscal Responsibility Act is considering some of the largest budget cuts in history by certain standards, but as a percentage of total spending, is no better than the 2011 Budget Control Act, which is to say it likely does not go far enough, showing that neglecting the mandatory spending side of the ledger and kicking the can down the road has made balancing the budget practically impossible — and continues to exact a mounting toll on U.S. taxpayers and creditors.
Robert Romano is the Vice President of Public Policy at Americans for Limited Government Foundation.
To view online: https://dailytorch.com/2023/05/mccarthy-says-debt-deal-largest-spending-cut-in-history-is-he-correct/
Trump Up Big Over DeSantis with California Conservatives but DeSantis Has Slight Edge with Moderates
By Manzanita Miller
After last week’s announcement by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis that he is officially running against former President Trump for the GOP nomination, polls continue to show Trump ahead by wide margins, especially among strongly conservative voters.
A New UC Berkeley poll shows Trump ahead by eighteen percentage points (44% to 26%) among California Republicans, a reversal from three months ago when Trump trailed DeSantis by eight points.
Despite DeSantis making an appeal to socially conservative voters when he launched his campaign last week, Trump leads DeSantis among strongly conservative voters, while moderates appear open to considering a new candidate.
Among strongly conservative Californians, 87% hold a favorable view of Trump, while among moderates, 56% view him positively. DeSantis performs significantly worse with strongly conservative voters, but fares about as well as Trump with moderates.
This is notable because California Republican voters are a group which on paper could favor DeSantis. Polling data has shown that DeSantis’ strongest support stems from higher-income and higher-educated voters, particularly in the Generation X age cohort.
The Berkeley poll shows Trump’s approval rating has been increasing substantially in California over the past few months, despite his legal battle dominating headlines. Since February, the percentage of California Republican voters holding a positive view of Trump has increased five percentage points from 69% to 74%.
Over the same period, DeSantis’ favorability rating dropped slightly from 79% to 75% according to the poll. However, the share of voters who hold a strongly favorable view of DeSantis declined ten percentage points from 54% to 43% according to the poll.
Trump enjoys a substantial advantage among men and likely non-college voters according to the UC Berkeley poll, a finding that has been observed in nationwide polls as well. DeSantis performs better among moderates, where he competes neck and neck with Trump among likely Republican voters.
The poll also hints at a pattern in California that runs contrary to the recent national and early primary state polls. In national polls as well as a recent Iowa poll, Trump is the frontrunner among younger voters, but this does not appear to hold in California.
A recent Emerson poll of Iowa GOP voters found that voters aged eighteen to thirty-four favor Trump over DeSantis by a whopping 62 percentage points. That lead drops to a 28-point lead among voters aged thirty-five to forty-nine years old. The poll found among voters aged fifty to sixty-four, Trump earns a 33-point lead over DeSantis, and among voters over 65, Trump’s lead increases again to 47 percentage points over DeSantis. However, younger California Republicans appear to favor DeSantis slightly, as DeSantis enjoys a slight edge over Trump with voters under 40 according to the pollsters.
The latest nationwide Real Clear Politics poll highlights Trump's commanding position with 56% of the vote, while DeSantis trails at 19.9%, and Mike Pence garners 5.9% support.
This comes on top of polling showing Trump is gaining ground nationally with most groups within the Republican party, and leads DeSantis by wide margins with young people, minorities, independents, and lower-income voters.
YouGov polling conducted in late March compared to now shows Trump has gained 9 percentage points with voters under thirty since news of his indictment broke. He has also gained 7 points with lower-income voters and 6 points with Independents.
Even urban voters and moderates have incrementally inched Toward the trump in recent weeks, supporting him by 4 percentage points higher than they did in March. Trump has also gained incrementally with minorities, adding two points apiece with Black and Hispanic voters over the past month.
YouGov polls also show over half of GOP primary voters aged 18-29 have a favorable view of Trump (51%) compared to only 43% for DeSantis. Among voters aged 30-44, Trump is favored by 49% while DeSantis has the support of 36%. For voters aged 45-64, Trump leads DeSantis by 7 percentage points. However, voters over 65 prefer DeSantis by 5 percentage points nationally.
Previous polling data from Emerson College finds that education is another primary variable that splits Trump and DeSantis voters. Trump leads the Florida governor by 56 percentage points among voters with a high school education or less. His highest support continues to come from voters with some college education but no degree, where he leads DeSantis by a full 63 percentage points, and that drops to a lead of 24 points among college graduates.
In recent elections, educated and affluent Californians in suburban areas like Orange County, who have typically supported the Republican Party, have shifted their allegiance toward Democrats in the post-Trump era. This trend began during the 2016 presidential contest and has persisted in subsequent elections.
While California is a decidedly left-leaning state, California sends 169 delegates to the Republican National Convention, making the state influential in the selection of a primary candidate. Based on early polling, it appears California moderates may put up a fight against Trump and move to select DeSantis, despite the Governor’s conservative social stances. However, California moderates will have to go head-to head with conservatives who remain steadfast Trump supporters.
Manzanita Miller is an associate analyst at Americans for Limited Government Foundation.
To view online: https://dailytorch.com/2023/05/trump-up-big-over-desantis-with-california-conservatives-but-desantis-has-slight-edge-with-moderates/
Michael Quinn Sullivan: Crony Establishment Will Veto Your Vote
The Democrat-led impeachment of Ken Paxton represents an escalation in the war on grassroots activism.
By Michael Quinn Sullivan
Ken Paxton’s most egregious crimes were not those given as excuses for impeachment by 61 Democrats and 60 Republicans in the Texas House. His true, and most inexcusable crime, was to challenge the autocratic rule of the Lone Star State by an unholy alliance of leftists Democrats and crony, anti-free market business Republicans.
None of this is a secret. They explained themselves in 2022 when opposing Ken Paxton in the primary and general elections. And they have engineered a situation where the third-place finisher in the GOP primary is being seriously discussed as a replacement for Paxton.
Collusion Between Corporatists and Democrats
It has long been an open secret in the Texas Capitol that the establishment lobby group Texans for Lawsuit Reform never liked Ken Paxton. State records and interviews show the organization has never supported Paxton in his primary elections. They have, however, in previous cycles helped in his November elections against Democrats.
But not in 2022. TLR had reportedly grown frustrated with Paxton using the powers of the Office of the Attorney General to aggressively combat the Biden administration, Big Pharma, and Big Tech. Coupled with his popularity among social conservatives and the grassroots, the establishment-backing TLR made removing Paxton a 2022 priority.
They failed expensively. Their preferred candidate was liberal Republican Eva Guzman, who shared the same corporatist / big-business vision of the Democrat who has long run TLR’s agenda, a refugee from the Jimmy Carter administration named Dick Trabulsi.
Handing Democrats A Seat In The Senate
Partnered with home-builder and social liberal Dick Weekley, Trabulsi has made sure TLR is only just conservative enough. When given a choice between two viable Republican candidates, they chose the more liberal.
And, when given the chance, they flood money donated by Republicans into the coffers of Democrats. For example, in 2022 they bankrolled liberal Democrat Morgan LaMantia. The open-seat senatorial race had a viable, conservative Republican conservative. LaMantia won by less than 700 votes out of over 175,000 cast.
(TLR’s excuse was they were trying to prevent an even worse Democrat. That’s hard to imagine, given LaMantia worked in lockstep against conservative and Republican priorities during the 2023 legislative session.)
It Wasn’t Just Paxton in 2022
It should be noted that Paxton wasn’t the only incumbent statewide Republican to be targeted by TLR and the crony wing of the Republican Party. The other was Sid Miller.
Perhaps the most consequential Commissioner of Agriculture since Rick Perry in the early 1990s, Miller is a grassroots favorite who took the office by storm. His chief crime in the eyes of the Austin crony establishment was his early endorsement of, and tight relationship with, Donald Trump.
TLR ran an affable out-going state representative against him, but Miller got 58.5 percent of the vote in a three-way race.
Their work against Miller made it clear that whatever tangential interest Texans for Lawsuit Reform still has in “lawsuit reform” is of tertiary concern to their real interest in pushing the GOP to be less conservative.
TLR/Guzman Originated The Impeachment ‘Charges’
In backing Guzman for Attorney General, TLR had a backbench Republican on the Texas Supreme Court without much of a record. Yet they dumped an unprecedented $4 million into her GOP primary race – much of it to finance attacks on Paxton.
Not coincidentally, those attacks were the same talking points used by the lieutenants of House Speaker Dade “Is he Drunk?” Phelan.
Indeed, every single charge levied by the House impeachment was lifted—seemingly point for point—from the Guzman / TLR primary attacks.
Voters rejected the message and the messenger out of hand. Guzman revealed herself to be, at best, an ideologically rudderless politician without much of a personality. At worst, voters saw a liberal eager to unravel the legal gains Texas—under Paxton—had made in fighting federal overreach and woke corporatism.
She ended up barely making third place, getting 10,000 more votes than former U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert – whose campaign amounted to little more than an announcement. It can be assumed that all TLR’s money did for Guzman was get her the 10,000-vote edge on Gohmert.
And, of course, their dollars set in place the anti-Paxton narrative for the Democrats in the fall. Historically, TLR—to keep up appearances as a “Republican” group—has spent money in November helping statewide Republicans. Not in 2022. TLR seemed more interested in having a leftwing Democrat in the office. Again, they donated exactly $0 to Paxton’s general election campaign against an incredibly liberal Democrat.
While TLR hates Paxton’s fights against Big Tech and Big Pharma, the Democrats hate him for working against the Biden administration.
No one was hiding that. A headline from the Democrat-apologists at the Dallas Morning News from December 2022 screamed “Texas AG Ken Paxton’s lawsuits stymie Biden agenda on immigration and health care.”
In the article, the DMN’s Austin correspondent lamented, “Paxton’s lawsuits have had some of the biggest impact on immigration rules.” That wasn’t meant as a compliment.
Rejecting The Voters’ Choice
TLR pushed hard the line that Paxton was not going to win re-election in the November 2022 contest. Apparently, voters did not get that memo because they reelected him with the same spread as the rest of the state GOP ticket.
The Democrats and TLR were furious that they couldn’t sell Texas on a liberal of either the Republican or Democrat variety.
This was the impetus for the Phelan assault on Paxton. Everyone in House leadership knew they were playing with fire. Phelan and his team knew the rank and file could not withstand the pressure from voters in their plans were known—and, frankly, that their own case could not withstand scrutiny.
This is why the General Investigating Committee—the members hand-selected by Phelan to conduct the inquiry—did not invite the Office of the Attorney General to participate and answer questions or offer a competing narrative.
The committee operated in secrecy until just days before the vote, as much to keep the rest of the House in the dark as Paxton and the public. Then Phelan and the committee sprung forward with charges, demanding a vote on years-old charges in less than 72 hours.
Now, Guzman’s name is already being floated as the crony elite’s “preferred” replacement. The brazen disregard for the voters’ wishes is breathtaking in its tone-deafness.
The House’s Charges Against Paxton and Why They Are Lacking
The House’s articles of impeachment stem from five major fact areas, all mirroring the attacks Paxton withstood in the 2022 primary and general elections:
- Investigation of the FBI’s intervention in the dispute between Nate Paul’s World Class Holdings and the Mitte Foundation, (Articles I-V),
- Termination of senior staff and the defense of those terminations, (Articles VI-VIII; XV),
- Allegations that Paul bribed Paxton by providing a job for his mistress and renovations to his home, (Articles IX-X),
- Defending himself against securities charges brought during his initial election, Articles XII-XIII), and
- Filing an inaccurate personal financial statement, (Article XIV).
Paxton is also charged with various generic offenses stemming from those allegations in the catch-all charges in found in Articles XVI-XX.
The House’s articles of impeachment provide no direct evidence and little in the way of direct factual allegations. Moreover, all of the allegations stem from facts that were well-known to the public prior to Paxton’s reelection in 2022.
Indeed, many of the charges complain of Paxton’s public efforts to defend himself, including litigating against baseless securities fraud charges brought in 2014 and conducting a publicly-disclosed internal investigation of these charges. These charges reek of the worst caricatures of ancient inquisitions, where the accused is punished for protesting his innocence.
Texas Government Code 665.081, referred to as the “forgiveness doctrine,” codifies the state’s policy of removing officers only for those acts occurring since their most recent election. The House protests that Section 665.081 does not bind the “constitutional” process of impeachment. But, as with much the House did at the behest of Democrats, this misses the point.
The law sets out the policy of the State of Texas, which is to respect the opinion of voters when it comes to the conduct of their elected officials. Texas senators will have to grapple with this policy, and their respect for the wisdom of voters, when they take up the House’s charges.
Who’s Next?
It should be readily apparent that the impeachment of Ken Paxton is not going to be a one-off exercise, but—potentially—the new status quo in Austin. Since it is unlikely the Democrats will get anyone elected statewide for at least the next decade in Texas, they must instead work—for now—with establishmentarian Republicans and crony business associations to find “acceptable” Republicans.
Yet, as noted above, the voters did not play along in 2022.
This leaves the Democrats’ new toy of impeachment—or, at least, the threat thereof—to be leveled against Republicans who don’t genuflect before the establishment cabal of leftist Democrats and big business Republicans.
The 61 Democrats and 60 Republicans who made up the “overturn the voters” wing of the Austin uniparty, are the cabal’s new enforcers. Any Republican who starts coloring too far outside the lines set by the crony elite could find themselves Paxtoned by the House.
Reshaping Texas Through Impeachment
Even as voters double down on conservative priorities, the threat of impeachment is designed to chill the passions of any conservative statewide official. Scurrilous allegations spread by disaffected staff and breathlessly repeated by third-rate opponents could suddenly become grounds for impeachment.
If the Senate goes along with the skullduggery, Texans can expect the next A.G.—Guzman or not—to soften the state’s challenges to the Biden administration and woke corporate America. And it could have a chilling effect on anyone seeking to do in office what they promised voters in the elections.
It boils down to this: voters picked a fighter, and the crony elite is having a temper tantrum. Since they cannot win at the ballot box, they are attempting to do so through a misappropriation of the state’s impeachment process.
If this continues, Ken Paxton will be just the first casualty in a new war on Texas’ grassroots.
To view online: https://texasscorecard.com/commentary/analysis-crony-establishment-will-veto-your-vote/