Getting our Fiscal House in Order

Friends,

We've known for years that the trust funds supporting our nation’s most vital programs are on the brink of collapse. Yet rather than try to solve this problem, Congress has kicked the can down the road and avoided the tough debates needed to fix the mess we can all see coming.

This is unacceptable. These trust funds support critical programs like Medicare and Social Security, which people across Northeast Wisconsin depend on. We must find a way to ensure the federal government keeps the promises it has made and preserves these programs for years to come.

That's why this week I introduced the TRUST Act, a plan to help get our fiscal house in order. This bill would establish Congressional rescue committees tasked with strengthening each federal trust fund at risk of insolvency, and require Congress to vote on the ideas these committees come up with. It's not a silver bullet solution, but it's an exciting first step that will force Congress to work in a bipartisan fashion to find a plan we can agree on--something Congress has failed to do on its own.

We don’t know what answers the rescue committees will come up with, but we do know that without any action, we risk cuts to Social Security and Medicare or massive tax hikes down the road, both of which would be devastating to Northeast Wisconsin. 

Problems don't age well, and it's time for Congress to get serious about this problem. Many of these trust funds are projected to become insolvent within the next 13 years. There's no time to waste. 

Semper Fi,