The left’s $7 trillion lie: Biden far outpaces Trump in racking up the national debt

Projection is blami𝄹ng someone else for your own bad behavior.

We saw a classic case of projection in Thursday’s presidential debate, when President Biden — who is overseeing annual budget deficits of $2 trillion — asserted that his predecessor, Donald T🌄rump, added more to the federal debt than 🙈anyone else.

It’s part of the latest leftist argument: that if Trump wins the election, he will run deficits ⛦twice as large as Biden would.

Debate moderator Jake Tapper joined the chorus of federal finance falsehoods whe😼n he claimed Trump had “approved $8.4 trillion in new debt,” while Biden’s actions will increase the debt by (merely) $4.3 trillion over a decade.

Tapper was referencing a recent report by the leftꦐ-leaning Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, which twisted and turned the debt statistics in every contortionary way it could to reach its incredible conclusion.

CRFB, by the way, is a group that opposed the successful Trump tax reform in 2017 — yet supporte🐲d several of Biden’s 🦩multitrillion-dollar spending bills.

It’s not nonpartisan, but a front g꧑roup f🌺or the policies of the political left.  

🐷The fundamental flaw of the CRFB analysis is revealed if we examine the projections of the Congressional Budget Office.

The CBO’s projection for 2021, the last fiscal year of the Trump administration, forecast the federal debt to reach about $35.3 trillion 🦂by 2031, that is, over the next decade.

Today, 3½ years into the Biden administration, the la♈test estimates from the CBO project the debt will hit over $42.5 trillion by 2031.

In other words, the CBO now expects the debt to be $7.2 trillion higher than i🌺t had projected when Trump left office — all because of Biden’s recklꦺess spending policies.

Treasury Department figures also show the debt growing m⛄uch faster under Biden.

Over Trump’s entire term, incluဣding the 2020 spate of emergency COVID spending, the debt increased by $7.7 trillion — a staggering total, to be sure.

However, about 15% of that debt t🍸otal was the result of Treasury’s choice to keep additional cash on hand during the pandemic.

Former Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, unsure how much tax revenue would be collect🦩ed, borrowed well over $1 trillion — but kept it in reserve, without ever spending it.

Biden, however, spent that reserve, then borrowedℱ another $7 trillion on top of it.

Instead of simply allowing that one-time emergency COVID spendജing to expire, Biden and the Democr✃atic Congress continued spending at that same COVID-era level, thus institutionalizing multitrillion-dollar deficits.

Accounting for the changes in cash balan𓆉ces at the Treasury, the debt actually rose $6.5 trillion during Trump’s entire term — and is up $7.9 trillion in less than four years of Biden’s tenure.

Worse, the Treasury has announced 🧔that it anticipates needing to bꦯorrow from July through September of this year, followed by hundreds of billions more from October to December as federal finances further deteriorate.

All told, Biden will likely oversee a net increase in the debt of m🥀ore than $9 trillion in a single term — a new record.

Biden wanted to sꦐpend $2 trillion more in the last year and a half, but conservatives in the House blocked the added bloat. 

You can bet the farm that if the radical left wins the White House and Congress in 2024, that $2 trillion outlay will be first on the🐬ir legislat𒐪ive agenda. 

Biden’s other big lie, backed by the CRFB analysis, is that extending Trump’s tax reform will drown the economy in debt.

Yet federal tax revenues have increased since that tax re🔯form was enacted — and federal revenu𓂃es as a share of GDP have not fallen.

All of the increase in today’s debt ha꧅s been due to massive, out-of-control federal spending — by both parties.

Trump spent and borrowed too much, full stop.

But with a debt headed to $50 trillion if reelected and a political agenda ☂that stifles economic growth, Biden has set America on an unsustainable fiscal path that will lead to financial oblivion.

Stephen Moore and E.J. Antoni are Heritage Foundation fellows.