Issue Position: Budget and Tax Reform

Issue Position

Just as every family must set a budget to keep spending in check, so too must the federal government. As the only accountant in the United States Senate, I know how important it is to reduce the national debt by controlling spending. I strongly support balancing the federal budget and believe Congress should go further in straightening out the financial matters of our country.

When individuals and governments spend more than they can afford, our nation's economy suffers. For this reason, I support wholesale reform of the federal budget process to include creating a reserve fund for emergencies, establishing specific deficit targets and streamlining the budget process to allow more time for program oversight to see how federal money is being used. Reining in federal spending, reducing the budget deficit and injecting some reality into the federal budget process are key to our country's economic progress in the immediate future.

I support a temporary moratorium on congressional earmarks. Until Congress can develop a more transparent process, we should temporarily refrain from the annual end-of-year feeding frenzy.

I support pro-growth economic plans that provide welcome relief to taxpayers in every tax bracket, including small business owners, married filers and individuals who have capital gains or dividend income. I also support eliminating the death tax - permanently. By reducing the federal tax burden on individuals and businesses, Wyoming citizens and employers will have more money to spend and invest and create jobs. Americans, not the federal government, know best how to spend their hard earned money.

I supported the Bipartisan Task Force for Responsible Fiscal Action Act (S. 2853), introduced by Senators Judd Gregg (R-NH) and Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-ND). This legislation would have created a bipartisan panel of members of Congress along with representatives from the private sector and the Executive branch to review and make recommendations about all aspects of the Federal budget -- spending, revenues, entitlement programs, earmarks, budgeting for emergencies, and budget process reform. I realize that many people believe commissions serve no purpose except to produce reports no one reads before they are stacked on a shelf to gather dust. But the Gregg-Conrad commission would have been different. The recommendations of the panel (agreed upon by no less than a supermajority of the panel members) would have been fast-tracked in Congress and would have received a guaranteed up-or-down vote in both chambers. Unfortunately, the legislation creating this bipartisan panel failed when members tried to attach it to legislation raising the debt limit. President Obama created a similar panel by Executive Order, but without the force of law behind it, there is no guarantee that the recommendations of the President's commission will be any more successful than past reports in securing an up-or-down vote in Congress.

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