Conservatives ready to support $1 trillion hole in the budget
By Kelsey Snell and David Weigel January 5 at 6:35 PM
Some of the most conservative members of Congress say they are ready to vote for a budget that would — at least on paper — balloon the deficit to more than $1 trillion by the end of the decade, all for the sake of eventually repealing the Affordable Care Act.
In a dramatic reversal, many members of the hard-line House Freedom Caucus said Thursday they are prepared later this month to support a budget measure that would explode the deficit and increase the public debt to more than $29.1 trillion by 2026, figures contained in the budget resolution itself.
As they left a meeting with Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Thursday, some of the conservatives said that spending targets contained in the budget for fiscal 2017 are symbolic. The real goal of the budget legislation, they argued, is to establish an opportunity to finally make good on GOP promises to repeal President Obama’s signature domestic achievement.
“I just came to understand all the different ideas about where we go next,” said Rep. David Schweikert (R-Ariz.), a member of the House Freedom Caucus that typically opposes massive spending increases. Schweikert now says he will probably vote for the budget resolution.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/conservatives-ready-to-support-1-trillion-hole-in-the-budget/2017/01/05/76d4bf34-d391-11e6-a783-cd3fa950f2fd_story.html?utm_term=.410612193eb4&wpisrc=nl_politics&wpmm=1
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