Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) urged the public to mount a pressure campaign against their elected officials to cut spending and reduce the size of government.
In an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, Johnson bemoaned the state of government spending and waste, arguing that it would take a massive effort involving the public to accomplish fiscal conservatives’ longtime goal of cutting spending and balancing the budget.
“To succeed, we need the public to pressure their representatives to reduce the size, scope and cost of the federal government. That can happen only when the public has a greater awareness of the waste, fraud and abuse that is mortgaging our children’s future. Providing that information will be the goal of the budget review process,” Johnson wrote, adding hopefully that several “very well-known public figures” had contacted him to offer assistance.
Outside the public pressure campaign, Johnson urged President Donald Trump to follow through on his March 4 address to Congress to balance the budget for the first time in 24 years.
“More than any president in my lifetime, Mr. Trump has honored the promises he has made. I look forward to helping make this one a reality,” he wrote.
Johnson’s op-ed was in response to an opinion piece from Wall Street Journal editorial board member Kimberly Strassel, who praised the One Big Beautiful Bill Act but warned of an “ugly sequel.”
“All the talk instead is about new goodies, industrial policy and protecting home-state interests. The very real risk is that fiscal conservatives tee up a vehicle that becomes a grab-bag of new spending and bad policy, with little to no deficit reduction,” she wrote.
Johnson conceded that her fears were largely correct but vowed to do everything in his power to ensure that he would advocate against a second reconciliation bill that didn’t contain “far more significant spending and deficit reduction.”
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The U.S. accumulated a deficit of $1.83 trillion in fiscal 2024, an increase of $138 billion from the previous fiscal year, according to the Treasury Department. The current total U.S. debt is well over $37 trillion.
The Bipartisan Policy Center estimated that the One Big Beautiful Bill Act will cost $3.4 trillion over the next 10 years.