Return of Debt Ceiling

Floor Speech

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Mr. BURCHETT. Madam Speaker, the return of the debt ceiling on July 31 should flash fiscal warning signs for every elected official in Congress.

The debt ceiling was suspended for 2 years back in 2019. Since then, Congress has kept up its reckless spending habits like a teenage shopaholic at the mall with a credit card.

Now, government debt is over 100 percent of our domestic product--100 percent, Madam Speaker.

We clearly ignored the spending problems that got us into this mess in the first place. There needs to be a limit on how much debt elected officials can put on the taxpayers' shoulders.

My legislation, the Reforming America's Fiscal Toolkit Act, would amend Congress' budget process to keep government debt lower than our gross domestic product. This would limit how much financial trouble Congress can get the country into.

You know what they say, Madam Speaker: The first step to solving a problem is recognizing you have a problem, and dadgummit, Congress has a problem.

Congress needs to put a spending check on itself, or our country is going to end up like that out-of-control teenage shopaholic: bad credit, high interest rates, broke, and living in their parents' basement.

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