April 10, 2018
House Republican leaders, stung by President Donald Trump’s rebuke of Congress’ recent trillion-dollar spending spree, are moving to give their rank and file cover by passing a balanced budget amendment this week. But many conservatives, including a good number of House Republicans, say the vote is insincere at best — and blatantly hypocritical at worst. “There is no one on Capitol Hill, and certainly no one on Main Street, that will take this vote seriously,” said Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), on the heels of a $1.3 trillion spending package that Republicans approved just last month. “Leadership is just trying to check a box here,” added Andrew Roth, vice president for government affairs at the Club for Growth. “I don’t see how voters can distinguish between Republicans and Democrats when it comes to spending.” One conservative commentator, Barbara Boland, equated the upcoming exercise to “gorging on a sumptuous feast while insisting that you want a svelte physique.” And other members of the House Freedom Caucus, all of whom voted against a $1.3 trillion spending package in late March, are calling it little more than a charade. “The time to get spending under control was four weeks ago,” said Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), again referring to the late-March spending vote. “Coming back four weeks later and saying, ‘Oh, now we’re going to pound our chest like Tarzan and say we’re for a balanced budget amendment,’ it’s not going to fool anybody.”
Jordan and Meadows support the balanced budget amendment as a marker for fiscal austerity — it’s the timing of the vote, on the heels of the spending bonanza, that rankles them and other conservatives. The proposal requires supermajorities in both chambers to pass, as well as ratification by three-quarters of the states, an impossible hurdle. But with Republicans swimming in red ink — the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projected regular trillion-dollar annual deficits starting in 2020, despite a growing economy — the party feels pressure to do something. The CBO’s deficit forecast hasn’t been that bleak since the Great Recession. And this time, Republicans can’t blame Barack Obama and the Democrats. Democrats are blasting Republicans for what House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer called a “political stunt.” The Maryland Democrat on Tuesday said Republicans are “worried” about the midterm elections and “they’re flailing about.” “It sounds to me very much,” he said, “like they’re … saying one thing and doing another, speaking out of both sides of their mouth.”
