'This Myth Of Trickle Down Economics': Chris Deluzio Decries GOP's Big Beautiful Bill Defenses

On "Forbes Newsroom" Rep. Chris Deluzio (D-PA) spoke about the impact of the Big Beautiful Bill on the national debt.

Transcript

00:00Congressman, I work for Forbes, so we talk about big numbers all day long. I want to wrap our head

00:06around this because this number is just so big. Estimates say the package adds close to $3.4

00:11trillion to the national debt. So what exactly does that mean? If you're the average American,

00:17if you're a Pennsylvanian and you hear that, you hear that the debt is going up by trillions of

00:24dollars over the next decade, what specifically does that mean for you?

00:27Look, you should be worried about it, right? Our country's fiscal standing matters. Our country's

00:33ability to pay our bills and to meet basic needs, to keep us safe, to guard against threats at home

00:41and abroad, to meet the promise of things like Social Security and Medicare. All of that gets

00:46put at risk when we take on all of this debt. And again, this is not debt that this country is taking

00:51on to go fight World War II. This is debt that this country is taking on to help pay for tax giveaways

00:56to big corporations and the richest people in the history of humankind. I think it's foolish and

01:01reckless. And, you know, it's both conservative and liberal economists. It's experts who worry about

01:07our fiscal health who are sounding the alarm that just tacking on more and more debt, as you say,

01:13into the trillions is putting our country in a dangerous place. It's really, I think, fiscally

01:18irresponsible. And once again, I don't understand why my Republican counterparts have gone down this

01:25path to take on all this new debt, to put us at fiscal risk, to jeopardize the country's ability

01:32to issue new debt, to put our credit rating at risk, all to pay for tax giveaways at the very top.

01:38I think it's foolish. It doesn't make any sense to me.

01:40And some Republicans are saying that that number isn't accurate, that that 3.4 trillion or adding

01:45trillions of dollars to the debt isn't accurate, because you need to factor in the expansion of

01:50the tax cuts. What do you make of that, A? And B, is that a public PR spin? Are they saying that

01:56in private? I mean, what are those conversations with your Republican colleagues when it comes to

02:01the debt and deficit? Because Republicans have long touted themselves as deficit hawks.

02:07Well, the evidence is pretty clear. When we have had Republican presidents, they've ballooned the debt much

02:12more than Democratic presidents, certainly in my lifetime. And look, I don't know what my Republican

02:17counterparts really think and believe about this. But as you say, lots of them talked for a long time

02:22about being hawks on the deficit. I talk about fiscal responsibility a lot. This is fiscal year

02:28responsibility to pass this bill. And, you know, what we have seen from the first Trump term, I wasn't in

02:35Congress yet, but the tax cuts there at the very top, they did not generate extra economic activity

02:43that would pay for the big, huge hit to the debt and the deficit each year. So that hasn't worked.

02:49And my constituents in Western Pennsylvania know this myth of trickle-down economics. It has not

02:54worked out for us. It's not worked out for the American people. It's not worked out for the country's

02:59balance sheet. And so I think, again, this is just a pretty reckless path to go down. And instead,

03:04what we should have done, what we should do, is tax relief for the wide expanse of American people,

03:12working class, middle class, you name it, and ask those who make hundreds of millions and billions

03:17of dollars to pay a little more in taxes. That's what this country has traditionally done. I sometimes

03:21cite the top tax rates when conservative Republican Dwight Eisenhower was president. They were double,

03:28if not more than double, what they are now for the richest Americans, who I know can afford to pay a

03:32little more.