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Mitch McConnell on Budget & Economy

Republican Sr Senator (KY)

 


FactCheck:Inflation Reduction Act reduces inflation a little

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that the Senate would vote on the Inflation Reduction Act, the Democrats' package that tackles climate change, prescription drugs and inflation.

Republicans, meanwhile, have repeatedly criticized the legislation. McConnell has called it a "goody bag of far-left environmental activists at the expense of working families." He also says the bill would provide no relief, or worsen, inflation.

Data from the Congressional Budget Office shows the legislation would decrease the deficit by roughly $300 billion, but its impact on inflation in the immediate future is negligible. Larry Summers, who has been critical of the Biden administration's handling of the economy in the past, says the bill is a positive step and pushed back on critics who say the bill's impact on inflation won't be seen for a number of years. The bill "will have a positive impact on inflation--not a huge positive impact but a positive impact on inflation," Summers said.

Source: National Public Radio FactCheck on 2022 N. Y. Senate race , Aug 4, 2022

Voted to roll back Dodd-Frank banking regulations

Q: Tighten or loosen regulation of banks and credit card companies?

Mitch McConnell: Loosen. Opposed creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Voted to roll back Dodd-Frank banking regulations, which he called "heavy-handed."

Amy McGrath: Tighten. Criticized attempts to roll back Dodd-Frank banking regulations. Noted payday lenders are "preying on anyone who is low-income."

Source: CampusElect on 2020 Kentucky Senate race , Oct 10, 2020

Opposes infrastructure spending in COVID-19 relief bill

McConnell panned the idea of using a coronavirus stimulus bill to fund major infrastructure investment in a conference call with Republican senators. Trump has been floating the idea -- and McConnell is moving early to crush it and encouraging Republican senators to buck the president's freewheeling spending ideas. McConnell said he won't support infrastructure in a COVID-19 bill. "We need to keep the White House in the box," he told senators.
Source: Axios e-zine on 2020 Kentucky Senate race , Apr 28, 2020

Obama's far left agenda led to a mountain of debt

I was not surprised to see the public sour on the President and his plan. It was tremendously short sided. Our four fathers came here not looking for security, but for opportunity, and Obama's blatant attempt to Europeanize the country flies in the face of what America is all about. By pushing this far left agenda, all the Democrats had done was explode the government, bringing along a coinciding mountain of debt. The deficit for this year alone was bigger than the last four years alone of the Bush administration. Combined. It reminded me of what Margaret Thatcher once said: The problem with Socialism is you soon will run out of other people money. Policies like this could not be sustained in the long term and all are doing was leaving a whole lot of problems our children will have to deal with . So were people angry? Yes. And for good reason.
Source: The Long Game, by Mitch McConnell, p.200 , May 31, 2016

Proud of role in high-profile deal to end federal shutdown

Alison Grimes' campaign has waged a news-release campaign against McConnell since the partial government shutdown began, accusing him daily of being responsible for the shutdown and labeling him "Senator Gridlock."

McConnell said that his high-profile part in the deal that ended the shutdown and extended the debt ceiling had taken the air out of Grimes' message. "It steps on the whole narrative of her campaign, and so she's desperately trying to criticize something I was praised for by Harry Reid, among others," McConnell said.

The Grimes campaign fired back by noting a number of past remarks McConnell has made proudly proclaiming himself a "guardian of gridlock." A Grimes spokesperson said, "It is an embarrassment that McConnell waited until the 11th hour to stop the manufactured crisis that he and members of Congress created. It is not heroic for McConnell to do his job and reopen the government. Kentuckians now have to pay for McConnell's Washington dysfunction."

Source: Lexington Herald Leader on 2014 Kentucky Senate debate , Oct 17, 2013

Supports sequester cuts: 2.4% out of $3.6 trillion budget

Q: Are these budget cuts a done deal?

McCONNELL: The question is: Are we going to keep the commitment we made to the American people a year and a half ago, a bipartisan agreement signed by the president, that we would reduce spending without raising taxes by this amount of money in this fiscal year? This modest reduction of 2.4% in spending over the next six months is a little more than the average American experienced just two months ago, when the payroll tax holiday expired.

Q: You call this a modest cut, but it will cost about 750,000 jobs.

McCONNELL: By any objective standard, cutting 2.4% out of $3.6 trillion is certainly something we can do.

Q: Over a short period of time?

McCONNELL: The sequester was actually the president's idea. He knows that we were not going to raise taxes to achieve this spending reduction this year. The American people need to know that we have a spending addiction in Washington. We've added $6 trillion to the national debt in just four years.

Source: CNN SOTU 2013 interview on 2014 Kentucky Senate race , Mar 3, 2013

2008 economic bailout: put Main Street ahead of Wall Street

The bottom fell out of the American financial markets and it looked like the entire economic system could be in jeopardy. Fairly or not, some citizens blamed McConnell for it. After a first multi-billion dollar bailout measure failed to pass the House, he continued pushing for bipartisan action. Describing the financial worries of his constituents, and blaming the problem on "the bad decisions of those in the subprime housing market," he declared: "The only reason to support this action is to save ordinary Americans from an economic disaster that they had no hand in creating. If we are to take action then it needs to put Main Street ahead of Wall Street. This isn't about bailing out investment bankers, this is about keeping the US economy from entering a downward spiral. To that end, any action we take must include the following: limits on executive compensation, debt reduction, congressional oversight and transparency, and taxpayer protection."
Source: Republican Leader, by John Dyche, p.226 , Sep 15, 2010

Sponsored disapproving of increasing the debt limit.

McConnell sponsored Joint Resolution on Debt Limit

Congressional Summary:JOINT RESOLUTION: Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives: That Congress disapproves of the President`s exercise of authority to increase the debt limit, as submitted on Jan. 12, 2012.

Congressional Vote: Vote #4 in the House: 239 Yeas; 176 Nays; Senate declined to vote on the Resolution.

OnTheIssues Explanation: On Jan. 12, 2012, Pres. Obama notified Congress of his intent to raise the nation`s debt ceiling by $1.2 trillion, two weeks after he had postponed the request to give lawmakers more time to consider the action. Congress then had 15 days to say no before the debt ceiling is automatically raised from $15.2 trillion to $16.4 trillion. Hence the debt ceiling was increased.

In Aug. 2011, the US government was nearly shut down by an impasse over raising the debt ceiling; under an agreement reached then, the President could raise the debt limit in three increments while also implementing $2.4 trillion in budget cuts. The agreement also gave Congress the option of voting to block each of the debt-ceiling increases by passing a `resolution of disapproval.` The House disapproved; the Senate, by declining to vote in the 15-day window, killed the Resolution. Even if the resolution were passed, Pres. Obama could veto it; which could be overridden by a 2/3 majority in the House and Senate. The House vote only had 57% approval, not enough for the 67% override requirement, so the Senate vote became moot. The same set of actions occurred in Sept. 2011 for the first debt ceiling increase.

Source: HJRes.98/SJRes34 12-SJR34 on Jan 23, 2012

Audit the Federal Reserve & its actions on mortgage loans.

McConnell co-sponsored Federal Reserve Transparency Act

The Federal Reserve Transparency Act directs: