‘We Do Have A Deficit Problem’: Former Obama Administration Official Dumps Cold Water On MSNBC

‘We Do Have A Deficit Problem’: Former Obama Administration Official Dumps Cold Water On MSNBC

Harold Hutchison on May 11, 2023

Former Obama administration official Steve Rattner said Thursday that the United States had “a deficit problem.”

“We shouldn’t kid ourselves, we do have a deficit problem,” Rattner said during an interview on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “The problem is the growing deficit without doing something.”

WATCH:

The House of Representatives passed HR 2811, the Limit, Save, Grow Act, on April 26 by a 217-215 vote. The legislationincreases the debt ceiling by $1.5 trillion, repeals portions of the Inflation Reduction Act, requires Congress to approve regulations that have an economic effect of $100 million or more and establishes new work requirements for welfare programs.

“Here’s our budget, $6.3 trillion. Moist of most of it is made up of things Congress doesn’t appropriate on a yearly basis: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, those things are locked in. Defense, which people consider to be locked in,” Rattner said, pointing to a pie chart. “What we’re fighting about, what Republicans are aiming at, is this 11% slice of the budget.”

“Where that becomes important is because when you start cutting the amount they want to cut, you’re only cutting from this, which means in order to achieve their number, they want to cut 47% of that,” Rattner continued. “That includes all these things, NASA, energy, labor, justice, state, all would have budgets cut by 47%.”

President Joe Biden and Democrats have demanded that the debt ceiling be increased without any conditions. Biden metwith House Speaker Kevin McCarthy of California, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York about the debt ceiling Tuesday, and plan to meet again Friday.