Perdue Aligns with White House in Push to Put Earned Benefits Programs on the Chopping Block

After stacking nearly $2 trillion onto the national debt, Republicans join Perdue in threatening cuts to earned benefits programs for middle-class families

ATLANTA — Yesterday, Senator David Perdue received new support for his push to put earned benefits program on the chopping block: President Donald Trump backed calls to put Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid on the table for cuts.

Perdue has a long history of trying to chip away at earned benefits programs that older Georgians rely on. He’s previously railed against critical earned benefits that middle-class families have worked hard for, saying spending on programs like “Social Security and Medicare” is “the problem” and blaming them for “causing this debt.”

Of course, Perdue’s calling to put these critical programs on the chopping block after he voted for a deficit-busting corporate tax giveaway that added nearly $2 trillion to the national debt — and did even more damage to these earned benefit programs as it “trimmed a year of solvency from the primary Medicare trust fund and had a negative effect on the Social Security trust fund.”

Now, with the president’s previous budget proposal already calling for nearly $2 trillion in cuts to programs like Medicare and Medicaid and billions from Social Security, Perdue has found yet another ally in Washington for his crusade attacking vital earned benefits programs for middle-class families and older Georgians.

“Yesterday’s announcement by the president that he’s open to cutting crucial earned benefits programs brings Senator David Perdue one step closer to his long-held goal of putting programs like Social Security and Medicare on the chopping block,” said Alex Floyd, spokesman for the Democratic Party of Georgia. “Instead of standing up for middle-class families and the benefits they’ve worked hard for, Perdue and his Washington Republican allies continue to prove they’re always willing to put corporate tax breaks and their radical, reckless agenda ahead of everyday Georgians.”

NYT: Trump Opens Door to Cuts to Medicare and Other Entitlement Programs

• President Trump suggested on Wednesday that he would be willing to consider cuts to social safety-net programs like Medicare to reduce the federal deficit if he wins a second term, an apparent shift from his 2016 campaign promise to protect funding for such entitlements.

• Despite promises to reduce the federal budget deficit, it has ballooned under Mr. Trump’s watch as a result of sweeping tax cuts and additional government spending.

• Asked in an interview with CNBC if cuts to entitlements would ever be on his plate, Mr. Trump answered yes.

• “At some point they will be,” Mr. Trump said, before pointing to United States economic growth. “At the right time, we will take a look at that.”

• Mr. Trump suggested that curbing spending on Medicare, the government health care program for the elderly, was a possibility.

• The president has already proposed cuts for some safety-net programs.

• His last budget proposal called for a total of $1.9 trillion in cost savings from mandatory safety-net programs, like Medicaid and Medicare.

• It also called for spending $26 billion less on Social Security programs, the federal retirement program, including a $10 billion cut to the Social Security Disability Insurance program, which provides benefits to disabled workers.

• Following the $1.5 trillion tax cut that Republicans passed in 2017, some suggested that they would quickly turn to reduce the cost of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

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