Sen. Deb Fischer
Sen. Deb Fischer says President Barack Obama’s proposed budget spends too much and does nothing to reduce the federal debt.
Fischer, a Republican, says she’s looking passed what the president has proposed and looking to her colleagues to propose a budget the steers the country toward an annual spending plan than balances.
“If 10 years down the road we can get a budget that balances; that is what I hear from Nebraskans. I’ve heard it the last three years: cut back on the spending and live within your means,” Fischer tells Nebraska reporters in a conference call. “We do that as families and we need to do that as a country.”
President Obama, a Democrat, has proposed a $4 trillion spending plan for the next fiscal year. It would raise taxes by $2 trillion over the next 10 years.
Fischer says Congress must cut back on spending and set the country on a course to balance the budget in the near future.
“We cannot continue down that road of adding more and more and more debt. It’s not fair to our children or our grandchildren and I would say now it’s not fair to our great-grandchildren,” Fischer says. “That’s a threat to our national security.”
Fischer says she is taking the budget documents home with her this weekend to read them in depth, though she doesn’t expect the president’s budget to go anywhere. Fischer says even Democrats didn’t show much interest in the president’s budget in the past.
“When the Democrats were in control of the Senate, they didn’t even bring up the president’s budget to vote on.”
AUDIO: Sen. Deb Fischer comments on President Barack Obama’s proposed budget. [2 min.]