GOP senator threatens House megabill: 'You don’t defeat the deep state by funding it'

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) on Sunday slammed the budget bill passed by his colleagues in the House of Representatives, telling CNN’s Jake Tapper “you don’t defeat the deep state by funding it.”

Johnson followed a CNN interview with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), who called the reconciliation bill “a serious attempt to address the deficit and the debt and have the economy grow.”

Asked “on a scale of 1 to 10" how well the legislation tackles the debt, Johnson laid out his “disappointments with the House process.”

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“The only number we ever heard about was 1.5 trillion, which sounds like a lot, but it's only $150 billion per year,” Johnson said of spending cuts in the House bill. “And this is put in context of the fact that in 2019 we spent $4.4 trillion, this year will spend over $7 trillion. $150 billion on that is basically a rounding error.”

Johnson argued we “need to get serious about this.”

“The house bill would probably add, I've calculated 4 trillion,” Johnson said. “… We have to reduce the deficit. And so we need to focus on spending spending, spending. You don't defeat the deep state by funding it.”

Asked where he would make cuts, Johnson urged his colleagues to return to “reasonable pre-pandemic level spending.”

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"You have to do the work and you need the time to do the work,” Johnson said. “… No one would even notice it other than the grifters who are sucking down the waste, fraud and abuse.”

Watch the full interview below or at this link.

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