Biden says budget targets Trump’s ‘fiscal mess,’ raises taxes on wealthy

WASHINGTON, March 28 (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday submitted a $5.79 trillion budget plan to Congress that calls for record peacetime military spending and further aid for Ukraine, while raising taxes for billionaires and companies and lowering government deficits.

Biden’s budget proposal for the 2023 fiscal year starting Oct. 1, lays out his administration’s priorities, including campaign promises to make the wealthy and companies pay more tax. It is merely a wish list as lawmakers on Capitol Hill make the final decisions on budget matters.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Congress looked forward to working on Biden’s “bold fiscal blueprint.” Republicans and moderate Democrats killed similar tax proposals in the 2022 budget.

The plan was based on economic assumptions from November, well before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which has exacerbated previous inflationary pressures on energy and food prices, but Biden’s top economic adviser Cecilia Rouse said the administration still sees the U.S. economy strengthening and inflation easing over the coming year. read more

“The budget I am releasing today sends a clear message to the American people (about) what we value: first, fiscal responsibility, second, safety and security, and thirdly … the investments needed to build a better America,” Biden told reporters at the White House.

The Democratic president said he was calling for higher defense spending to strengthen the U.S. military and “forcefully respond to (Russian President Vladimir) Putin’s aggression against Ukraine” with $1 billion in additional U.S. support for Ukraine’s economic, humanitarian, and security needs.

The document offers fresh insight into Biden’s thinking as he attempts to halt the largest war in Europe since World War Two and prepares for a Nov. 8 midterm election that could see his Democratic Party lose control of Congress.

His administration is “making real headway cleaning up the fiscal mess I inherited”, Biden said, and would reduce the federal deficit by more than $1.3 trillion this year with $1 trillion in further reductions planned over the next decade.

“For most Americans the last few years were very hard, stretching them to the breaking point. But billionaires and large corporations got richer than ever,” he said, adding, “That’s not fair.”

The U.S. federal government, on the hook for rising healthcare and social spending, especially for older Americans, has spent more money than it has taken in for each of the last 20 years.

BILLIONAIRES TAX

Lindsey Graham, the top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, said Biden’s tax hikes would harm U.S. workers and the overall economy, while increasing deficits.

Under Biden’s policies, deficits as a share of the economy would fall to 5.8% of gross domestic product (GDP) this year and stay below 5% over the next decade. That compares to 14.9% of GDP in 2020, the last year of the Trump administration, the White House said.

Biden’s plan increases spending on community policing, efforts to fight gun crime, and bigger investments in crime prevention and community violence interventions, as well as…