GOP Weekly Address: Sen. Jeff Sessions on Growing the Economy

US Senate(WASHINGTON) — “We need to grow the economy — not the government.”

That’s what lawmakers in Washington should be focused on, says Sen. Jeff Sessions, in this week’s Republican address.

Ahead of next week’s unveiling of Senate Democrats’ first budget in four years, Sessions (Ala.), warns that the new plan will include tax gimmicks and new spending that will only grow the government, not the economy.

“We have a moral duty We have a moral duty to balance the federal budget and bring the deficit down to zero.  This is the great challenge of our time,” says Sessions, the ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee.  

“But I fear the Democrat proposal will fail this defining test and will never achieve balance.  I fear it will crush American workers and our economy with trillions in new taxes, spending and debt.  I fear Chairman [Patty] Murray will follow the President’s lead: raising taxes to enrich the bureaucracy at the expense of the people,” he adds in the address.

Sen. Murray, D-Wash., is the Senate Budget Committee chair, and is expected to roll out proposals for taming the national budget in the coming days.

But Sen. Sessions says that while Senate GOP are prepared to reform Washington’s spending to grow the economy, balance the budget and create jobs, Sen. Dems are “determined to shield [the Washington establishment] from accountability.”

The Alabama senator says, “We are at the breaking point,” and asserts that destructive policies employed by Democrats in Washington cannot continue.

“Instead, we must act to create more jobs and better pay. And we can do it without adding to the debt,” he says, explaining how:

• Make welfare temporary and the welfare office an employment and job training office.
• Unlock America’s vast energy resources to create millions of good-paying jobs.
• Defend American workers from unfair foreign trade practices.
• Reform the tax code to make America globally competitive, creating more jobs here.
• Make government leaner, less wasteful so it produces greater results for the money you earned and sent here.
• Enforce an immigration policy that protects legal U.S. workers from unlawful competition.
• Eliminate every burdensome federal rule or regulation that isn’t needed and that destroys jobs.
• And, finally, we must balance the federal budget.

“These steps will empower Americans—not the government,” he says.

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