WASHINGTON – House Republicans on Tuesday unveiled a proposed budget for 2016 that partly privatizes Medicare, turns Medicaid into block grants to the states, repeals the Affordable Care Act and reaches balance in 10 years, challenging Republicans in Congress to make good on their promises to deeply cut federal spending.
The House proposal leans heavily on the policy prescriptions that Rep. Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin outlined when he was budget chairman.
With the Senate now also in Republican hands, this year’s proposal is more politically salient than in years past, especially for Republican senators facing re-election in Democratic or swing states like Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Illinois and New Hampshire, and for potential Republican presidential candidates.
Ryan’s successor, Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., promised Monday “a plan to get Washington’s fiscal house in order, promote a healthy economy, protect our nation and save and strengthen vital programs like Medicare.”
Democrats – and those Republicans who support robust military spending - will not see Price’s “Balanced Budget for a Stronger America” in those terms. Opponents plan to hammer Republican priorities this week, as the House and Senate budget committees officially begin drafting their plans Wednesday, and then try to pass them through their chambers.
On Monday, President Barack Obama tried to get ahead of the debate by criticizing Republican plans to abide by strict domestic and military spending caps.
“I can tell you that if the budget maintains sequester-level funding, then we would actually be spending less on pre-K to 12th grade in America’s schools in terms of federal support than we were back in 2000,” the president said.
The House Republican budget says it would reach a $13 billion surplus in 2024 and a $33 billion surplus in 2025. But it does so by projecting that increased economic growth related to its policy prescriptions will generate $147 billion in additional tax revenues for the government over the next 10 years. Without that so-called dynamic scoring, the budget will never come into balance.
Spending on Medicaid would be cut substantially over 10 years, with the money turned into block grants to state governments.
The budget adds “emergency” war spending through the “overseas contingency operations” account, which does not count against the spending limits, and it includes $94 billion to fight the “global war on terrorism” in 2016.
The House budget would also repeal much of Obama’s 2010 law regulating Wall Street financial firms, and it would cut food stamps significantly.
