Hi John,
Did you catch my latest video about how our elected officials are trying to use COVID to take away our social safety net? I wanted to share it with you, because I’ve gotta say: I’m tired of hearing about the deficit.
Since the CARES Act passed, Republicans and corporate Democrats such as my opponent have been voicing “serious concerns” about the stimulus’s impact on the federal deficit.
Chris Coons has spent the majority of his tenure in the Senate talking about the deficit. And he’s repeatedly used it as an excuse to call for cuts to programs like Medicare and Social Security.
- In 2010, he said that “all options are on the table” when asked about cutting Social Security.
- In 2011, he called for cuts to “entitlement programs” to lessen government spending.
- In 2013, he again called for “entitlement reform.”
- In 2017, he wrote an Op Ed on the merits of Ronald Reagan’s tax reform.
- And last year, he co-sponsored legislation to trigger automatic cuts to critical programs like Medicare, SNAP, and ACA subsidies.
It seems that Chris Coons believes the way to shrink the federal deficit is through austerity: by cutting social welfare programs to reduce government spending.
The thing is, study after study has shown that cutting funding to entitlement programs actually worsens the deficit: it slows GDP growth and widens our country’s wealth gap.
If we want to shrink the deficit, we need to get more money into the hands of workers, so that they can put that money back into the economy.
Instead of touching our entitlement programs, let’s stop giving tax cuts to millionaires and mega corporations.
- Jess
PS: Last weekend we broke our record for the most dials in a day. Can you sign up to phone bank this week so we can set a new record?
