The conservative advocacy group founded by former Vice President Mike Pence, Advancing American Freedom, urged Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill to commit to steep budget cuts to return federal spending to pre-pandemic levels.
The message, relayed in a Monday letter sent to GOP congressional offices and first seen by the Washington Examiner, comes amid bipartisan efforts to fund the government by a Sept. 30 shutdown deadline.
“With the upcoming appropriations fight, it is of the utmost importance that conservatives do not settle for [former President Joe Biden’s] spending levels,” wrote AAF President Tim Chapman and Executive Vice President Paul Teller. “Merely keeping the government open is not sufficient. Shrinking the size and scope of government while advancing conservative policies into law is a win.”
The group also urged Republican appropriators to complement the implementation of President Donald Trump’s tax cut and spending law, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, by defunding “dangerous transgender surgeries and eliminating incentives for states to cover illegal aliens on Medicaid.”
Congress is expected to try to pass a stopgap funding measure in the coming weeks to give appropriators more time to craft a year-long budget; passage of any legislation in the Senate will require Democratic support to break a filibuster.
Senate Democrats, wielding what leverage they have in the minority, are thrusting expiring Obamacare credits into the center of the shutdown brawl by demanding the extension of enhanced health insurance premium subsidies set to expire at year’s end. The White House’s latest attempt to claw back spending previously approved by Congress, through what’s known as a pocket rescission, is also complicating efforts to reach a bipartisan deal that will be needed to stave off a shutdown.
The current national debt stands at over $37 trillion, which exploded from $23 trillion before the pandemic due to government stimulus programs for workers, less revenue, and overall increases across federal agencies. The deficit for fiscal 2024 was roughly $1.8 trillion.
PENCE GROUP AAF TELLS HILL REPUBLICANS TO IGNORE ‘WILDLY INACCURATE’ CBO
Heartburn over the national debt from fiscal hawks presented a major point of contention this summer as the GOP debated Trump’s tax agenda in his megabill, with the Congressional Budget Office predicting the law will add nearly $4 trillion to the debt over the next decade. Many Republicans rejected the analysis as “wildly inaccurate,” including AAF, arguing the nonpartisan budget forecaster failed to consider key economic growth factors and has a shoddy track record of reliable cost scoring.
“The Swamp will always claim the best time to fight is next time,” AAF wrote in its letter. “But we all know the truth: the time to fight is now. Not one more dollar for programs undermining the American way of life!”