Press Releases

Rep. Ron Estes (R-Kansas) released the following statement after the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its Budget and Economic Outlook.

"The CBO's recently released projections reflect the inescapable fact that the fiscal state of our nation is in terrible condition," said Rep. Estes. "The current debt of $36.2 trillion is estimated to increase in 2025 due to an additional $1.9 trillion deficit by the end of the year. In ten years, those annual deficits are estimated to increase the gross debt to $59.2 trillion. That’s why my work on the Budget and the Ways and Means Committees is so important. We cannot continue to increase the debt burden on our kids and grandkids just to fund the lifestyle we live today. 

"At the same time, CBO, and the other entities that support them, must also address their shortcomings in accurately reporting the legislation Congress considers, as we’ve seen them underestimate the costs of the so-called Inflation Reduction Act and underestimate the economic growth and tax revenue from the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. With our debt at an unsustainable level, it's more important than ever that CBO fixes its scoring issues because we are making trillion-dollar decisions based on this analysis."

Background:
Rep. Estes has long been a leader in the fight to curtail Washington's wasteful spending and return Congress to regular order. He has cosponsored a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution multiple times and introduced an amendment to cut 1% of non-defense spending in a previous Congress. In 2023, he helped launch the Bipartisan Fiscal Forum and was appointed to serve on the Budget Committee’s Oversight Task Force. In the last Congress, Rep. Estes helped introduce the Business Cycle Balanced Budget Amendment, which would require the federal government to balance its budget and rein in out-of-control spending. He was recognized as a Fiscal Hero of the 118th Congress by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. In addition to his legislative work, Rep. Estes frequently writes about the debt and published an op-ed in National Review decrying Biden’s disastrous budget proposal and earlier wrote for Fox News on the danger of America’s coinciding fiscal pandemics.