CLAIM: President Joe Biden claimed during the State of the Union that over the the last two years, he “cut the deficit by more than $1.7 trillion – the largest deficit reduction in American history.”
VERDICT: MISLEADING. Biden is “distorting reality” when he claims his administration is responsible for reducing the deficit, according to CNN:
The deficit has been smaller under the Biden administration than it was at the end of President Donald Trump’s tenure. But the deficit has been bigger under the Biden administration than the nonpartisan federal Congressional Budget Office had projected it would be if the Biden-era federal government stuck with the laws that were in effect when Trump left office in early 2021.
Breitbart News’s John Carney has questioned how the Biden administration expects to sell to the America people that the president is fiiscally responsible:
[I]nflation has pumped up the federal government revenues. When nominal incomes of workers and profits of businesses rise, so do tax revenues. Inflation is great for the government even as it drives up the cost of living for American workers. The same thing is happening at the state and local level, where public budgets are unexpectedly overflowing with revenue thanks to inflation.
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Finally, it’s worth keeping in mind that the Biden administration’s attempts to unwind the Trump administration’s tax reforms have been largely stymied. One reason revenues are as good as they are is that the Trump tax cuts were pro-growth. The current revenue boom is taking place through the tax code President Donald Trump put in place.
Biden’s speech comes as Monday polling shows fewer than four in ten — under 40 percent — Americans say the state of the union is strong, while fifty-eight percent say it is not strong.
Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitter @WendellHusebø. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality.