There are a lot of reasons why Senate Republicans should kill the omnibus spending bill. Many reasons. Perhaps the most important is that if they don’t they’d be betraying the voters who elected a Republican House.
If the omnibus bill passes, then the Republican House will have to wait nearly a year before it can change priorities, restrain spending, and promote a true prosperity agenda. As Senator Blackburn said on our show last week, “Let the House Republicans take a swing at this thing.”
In a real sense, if the Senate Republican leadership and the Republican rank and file vote for the omnibus, they are betraying the voters and they’re also betraying their House leader, Kevin McCarthy.
As I mentioned last evening, the Republican Party from top to bottom should be lining up to support Mr. McCarthy and herald a new era in the U.S. House of Representatives. If Senator McConnell and the other leaders and the rank and file vote for the omnibus, they will betray millions of voters and the hopes of a new Republican agenda in the House.
A new Republican agenda in the House can build a new policy foundation for a Republican Senate and a Republican White House in 2024. This is the crucial logic.
Then again, Senator Paul was absolutely right when he told us last week that Senate Republicans have completely “abdicated the power of the purse” and that they have essentially “emasculated” themselves.
Remember, as Steve Moore has told us, 41 Senate Republicans can stop the omnibus and finally force the imposition of budget spending caps that have been in place more than 10 years, but are always waived — no matter who’s running the Senate. Republicans waive it. Democrats waive it. They are all complicit in a war against American taxpayers.
Before this year runs out, there are still 50 Republican senators.
Mr. McConnell, Senator Thune, and the other GOP leaders should be whipping to garner 41 votes to restore the budget caps and stop the omnibus. The automatic across-the-board savings might come to $150 billion, which is a darn sight better than a lame-duck spending spree of nearly $2 trillion.
I doubt they will, though, and that is too bad.
I am offering up my advice and suggestions. It won’t be the first time they’re rejected. Nor will it be the last. I think my cause is just, though.
Let me add that Mr. McCarthy was absolutely explicit last night, when I asked if he opposed the omnibus bill: “You’ve got these anonymous Republican Senate voices, people who are afraid to speak on the record. They’re saying that Kevin McCarthy really favors the omnibus spending bill and really doesn’t want to get down to business right away. What is your unequivocal response to that?”
“That’s a lie,” he answered. “Hell, no.”
The House leader couldn’t be any clearer, could he?
So, at risk of being redundant and rejected, I repeat: Senate Republicans are betraying the voters who elected a GOP House, and they are betraying Kevin McCarthy. They think they know best. I think they are wrong.
It’s not personal — they are long-standing friends of mine — but we have a big disagreement on policy.
There are other reasons to kill the omnibus bill, like we don’t need another $2 trillion in spending and borrowing. It all has inflationary potential. Frankly, I suspect there’s a lot of Covid assistance money that Democrats are building into the mandatory baseline — forever. Whether we ever find out about this remains to be seen.
As Dan Clifton reports, there’s a $100 billion corporate tax hike in this bill — which is insane — and no Republican should support it. There’s also an IRA tax hike coming down the road.
We’ve already had a 15 percent minimum corporate tax in the fraudulently named “Inflation Reduction Act”; a 1 percent tax on corporate buybacks, which is stupid; and Janet Yellen is in cahoots with the Europeans to slap a 15 percent minimum tax on American companies operating abroad — also stupid.
Immediate bonus depreciation drops off by 20 percent January 1, and I don’t hear GOP senators howling about that, either. I thought the Republican Party was against tax hikes. I thought the GOP criticized President Biden during the midterm election over tax hikes.
So, I will ask, why are Republican senators even thinking about a bill that has a large tax hike in it? What I see is a bunch of GOP senators voting to tax and spend, which I thought was the problem with the other party — the Democratic Party. So, there seems to be some political confusion here.
Then again, it’s the holiday season, and you know I’m always an optimist. I know we’re going to get a true economic prosperity agenda at some point. It’s just that right now, this evening, my vision is a little cloudy.
Please: Save America. Kill the omnibus.
From Mr. Kudlow’s broadcast on Fox Business News.
Larry Kudlow was the Director of the National Economic Council under President Trump from 2018-2021. His Fox Business show "Kudlow" airs at 4 p.m &. and his radio show airs on 770 ABC from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.
