Hillary Clinton Statement on the President's Budget

The only real significance of the President's budget is to serve as a legacy of his disastrous fiscal management over the last seven years. Once again we've seen the President's failed priorities laid bare in a budget that preserves every cent of his tax cuts for the wealthiest while placing the burden of his failures on the backs of working families, senior citizens, our police, our firefighters, our teachers and others.

Instead of budgeting a long term AMT fix to provide tax relief for the middle class, addressing our long term energy needs or prioritizing sensible health care reforms, this budget's biggest contribution is a commitment to more deficits and even more debt financed by countries like China. Instead of addressing the needs of low income families and working poor, the President has proposed cutting home heating assistance in the middle of winter by 22 percent, cutting rural health care programs by 86 percent and the deepest cuts, and completely eliminating a critical early education program, Even Start.

It has been seven years since this President squandered the opportunities of the surpluses created during the Clinton Administration, and it is past time to restore responsible fiscal management and put the priorities of middle class Americans first.