Washington, D.C. - House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington (R-TX) joined “Squawk Box” on CNBC to discuss the latest on foreign aid spending negotiations, including House Republicans’ fight to secure the U.S. southern border.
Click HERE to watch the full interview.
Chairman Arrington on Ukraine
“We need clear strategies, we need an end game, we need to define success [in Ukraine]. And I sent a letter to OMB Director Young, well over 30 days ago—I think she's weeks overdue to respond—to give us a full accounting of how much money we've spent. It's not just the $114 billion we appropriated. There have been reprogrammed and repurposed funds from other accounts. The Constitution is clear, I mean literally explicit, in that we should have an accounting of all public monies. We haven't gotten a response yet. So, I think the onus is on the President, for the things I just mentioned, with respect to Ukraine.”
Chairman Arrington on U.S. National Priorities
“I don't have a problem with supporting our allies against our enemies…I think you can argue that there is a national security interest there in Ukraine. That's why we've spent over 100 billion today. However, we have a bigger threat in my mind, as the Budget Chairman, as I look at the $34 trillion in debt, the 125% debt to our economic output—which is higher than World War II, and we're in relative peace and prosperity. So, sovereign debt crisis and a border crisis, I think are bigger threats, and we're not responsibly addressing them—that has to come first.”
Chairman Arrington on Critical Need to Secure the Southern Border
“We've got to secure the border—we've got to address the first and most important security threat to the American people, and that's the southern border.”
“The first priority is the border, period, and we've gotten nothing so far. We're losing tens of thousands of people to the drugs that are coming across the border. The crime, the terrorists, all of these are record numbers…we have to secure the border and stop this nonsense.
Chairman Arrington on Israel Supplemental and IRS Offset
“We've passed funding for Israel, we've offset that, I think that's the responsible thing to do. Andrew, you know all the data on where we are as a nation in terms of our indebtedness—I think the projections next year are a trillion dollars just to service the debt. That's just the interest payment. So we're in a bad way in terms of our fiscal affairs and in rapid decline. So I think [the offset] is the right thing to do. Now, we can negotiate what the offset is, but I'm proud that Speaker Johnson is changing the course here in Washington, and the culture, and restoring fiscal responsibility.”
“Look, while they're projecting, over 10 years, 100 billion in more revenue as a part of this tens of thousands of new IRS agents, we improperly pay waste, fraud and abuse $250 billion in one year—80 billion in Medicaid alone. We could pay for Israel, we could pay for the whole Israel package, Andrew, by just requiring a social security number for people who use the Child Tax Credit—that is $22 billion in savings. If we had a work requirement, like we do in the food stamp program, for Medicaid, just so we make sure that we have work-capable adults working in this country, which we desperately need, that's billions of dollars. We have other pay-fors besides the IRS. That's just one—one, I think, reasonable one—but we have many others.
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