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Congressional Daily Record
This section captures a floor statement or debate entry. It mentions members such as David Schweikert.
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June 30, 2026
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Download official House Record PDFReturn to issue contextUnder the Speaker's announced policy of January 3, 2025, Mr. Schweikert of Arizona was recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.)
Mr. SCHWEIKERT. Mr. Speaker, this is going to be another presentation of basically budget, debt, my frustration with this place, and my frustration with telling the truth.
our brothers and sisters, particularly from the left, a quarter millennium of a remarkable experiment. We have brought more freedom to the world, more prosperity to the world, more ingenuity to the world, more health to the world.
and Heaven knows I am a sinner on this. I am terrified of our unwillingness to
tell the truth about basic math. So we are going to walk behind these mikes over and over and over and desperately try to find whatever the dopamine hit is of the day, and yet, we will borrow another $6 billion, $7 billion today.
4 years old that day, running behind us. It was so much fun. Yet, the comments we received from the folks who are unique enough to watch something like this commented on the little boy, not necessarily the math.
I was trying to make the point at one moment saying: Here is my 4- year-old we have adopted. It is the greatest gift God has ever given someone, and he is healthy. We were terrified he would never be healthy. He was born with rather severe drugs. This government has made a decision we will need 104 percent of that little boy's lifetime earnings just to pay the Federal Government pensions, to cover Social Security, Medicare, military retirement, our retirement, 104 percent of the generation of young people today, we are so upside-down mathematically.
{time} 1910
didn't do it very well. We passed a housing bill. I voted “no” because there were too many gimmicks and it made government too big. Fine, personal opinion. I actually have a background in housing economics.
that one of the primary problems in affordability of you being able to purchase a home, Mr. Speaker, is the fact that if we had a normal debt load, then you would be paying 5.5 percent on today's 30-year loan. Instead you are paying 6.5 percent.
Why?
It is because the United States is going to borrow probably $2.3 trillion this year. We are crowding you out, Mr. Speaker. We are raising the price of money.
this up for much longer, then the bond market is going to run this country. We will exist in a fear of the weekly and monthly debt auctions.
between 2011, and right now the interest rate movement. This is interest rates. We are paying 1 point higher because of the scale of U.S. sovereign debt borrowing that when you buy that 30-year mortgage, Mr. Speaker, on an average priced home—and I think we used an average priced home in Arizona, not here in D.C.—you are going to pay about $2,500 more, and over the life of that loan, $76,000 more.
so much. We are responsible for that higher expense in the interest rates.
What happens when, Mr. Speaker, you and I go home?
We tell the truth.
Now, we make people angry because I am starting to worry: Voters, do you want us to lie to you?
Is that actually what you are asking for?
that make you feel this, but don't tell you the truth about the demographics, debt, and deficit?
we can give you. It is going to be a conversation of how we are going to fix it.
The data is actually pretty darn clear. Our borrowing raises your car loan, Mr. Speaker, and raises the cost of you financing your small business. Heaven knows, it is going to cost on an average home in Tempe, Phoenix—not Scottsdale—about $76,000 more in interest. That is a knockoff effect.
Let us actually start. I am going to produce a whole bunch of boards here. My rule used to be that I am going to give you the problem, Mr. Speaker, and then I am going to give you a series of solutions. I am tired of coming here with solutions and then realizing there is not a chance in hell—I can't even get cosponsors because it would mean telling the truth.
When I have come here and shown the MedPAC reports, there is $1 trillion, $2 trillion of misalignment because some of it is legal on the edge. We introduced a bill. The preliminary score was $1.84 trillion of savings over 10 years just to fix some of the things in Medicare Advantage that wouldn't cut a single service, and I got told this morning in conference: David, you don't understand. It has the word Medicare. We are not allowed to talk about that in an election year, but we will fix it next year.
I have been here 16 years, and it is always next year.
Let us take a look at this chart. I often start with this one because so few people understand.
Mr. Speaker, do you see the blue area?
is a reconciliation budget, except we now use reconciliation budgets to pass things, not save money. Here is your math problem: As of today, just this little net interest sliver for this fiscal year will be 20 percent of all tax receipts. So when you pay $1, 20 cents of that is just covering interest.
Mr. Speaker, I am going to show you some charts here that in 9 years how big that math actually gets. But understand, your government is functionally an insurance company with an army. I love that line. Think about it. It will make sense.
make this much bigger. People go to war with us when we are trying to cut down nondefense.
Mr. Speaker, a moment of truth. Let's have some fun here. DOGE identified $0.25 trillion in potential savings modeling. What has made it through the legislative process is about $7 billion, basically what we will borrow today.
I know folks aren't really good at math with lots of zeros. Our government borrows about $1 million every 13 seconds or so. In 13, 13.5 seconds, we borrow $1 million, and then $1 million. So often we will have debates here and say that this will save $3 million. I try to explain that it barely covered 30-some seconds of borrowing.
because we had the extraordinary measures where we didn't have a debt ceiling and we had to refund it. But if you do the last 12 months, we are borrowing about $98,000 per second.
I know everyone is going to talk about that, right?
All right, let's get to the math. Let's do some speed dating on math.
Do you see this chart, Mr. Speaker?
This is basically to make a point. We are in the OECD, basically the organization of developed economies.
Do you notice the red one down here, Mr. Speaker?
If you add up everything, Mr. Speaker, we are borrowing 7.9 percent of our entire economy. We are the worst in the entire industrialized world.
Mr. Speaker, if you actually start to take a look, you start seeing countries like Greece—and those are much healthier than we are. Do you realize today Greece can sell a 10-year bond substantially cheaper than the United States?
Of course, we are going to work on that and talk about it next year.
Let us actually walk through some of what is going on.
Remember, Mr. Speaker—I am going to try to make this point a couple of times through the presentation in some of the last slides—the primary driver of the debt is not a tax cut over here. It is our demographics. Next year the data looks like we are going to have fewer under 18 than we had 20 years ago and double the number 65 and up.
Are we allowed to actually say that?
It is not personal. It is not actually Democrat or Republican, it is just math.
{time} 1920
Mr. Speaker, I am blessed to hold the chairmanship for the Joint Economic Committee, so I have a handful of guys who all have Ph.D.'s, and we geek out on this. We are trying to find ways, and they are terrified with me.
from
found in so many programs—can I get a piece of legislation? Can we actually have an honest discussion of fixing it?
Well, we would have to take on the lobbyists. We would actually have to tell the truth. We would actually have to redesign the programs. We would actually have to have an honest conversation of some of the fraud we found in things like Medicaid and Medicare. Even then, understand, we have worked on this over and over.
missed payments, fraud. The majority of it isn't some international syndicate coming and stealing money from us. It is things we, as Members of Congress, have allowed to happen because when we find it, we don't go back and fix the law because that would be hard because we will have to take on advertising. They will say mean things about us.
“Raising spending, not falling revenues, have driven long-term deficits.”
Here is a point: Revenues. Go back to 2015 all the way through what we have modeled. You will notice it is consistent. It is basically that the long-term projection sits about 18.8 percent of the entire economy we are collecting. Back down here was slightly below, 17.8, 17.9. It is not tax cuts. It is demographics.
Here is the problem: Our spending, when we get 30 years from now, almost 28 percent of the entire economy, but I need to make a point. When you actually look at some of these charts, you are going to actually see—and I am bouncing around—if we do current policy—let me explain for those who are not budget geeks.
Here is the law. In our laws, we have: Oh, taxes are going to go back up in 4 years. Oh, that program is going to get cut in 4 years. We used to have this thing called paygo, pay as you go, except in the law, there was a scam. It says if it goes beyond 5 years, we have to find offsets to pay for it, but if you write the law that it ends in 5 years, even though they never end in 5 years because we always extend it, then you don't have to score it. You don't have to score it as more long-term debt. We lie in our budget documents.
Here is the current law. So last summer, 1 year ago, we had a whole fight about this. Do you use current law or current policy, even though this current law had all these things ending? So we couldn't win that so we used current policy, which actually gave it—extending of the current spending.
has basically stayed the same, but now you are borrowing about or spending about 32 percent of the entire economy. Then, you take another look at it: Budget deficits under current policy will exceed 14 percent of the entire GDP.
That is in 30 years. How many of you plan to be around in 30 years? If you plan to be around in 30 years, think about this: Treasury tomorrow wants to sell a 30-year bond. There is still a remarkably liquid market buying our bonds. When will the folks buying that 30-year bond start to realize: I have a problem.
policy baseline, you have about 14 percent of the country's GDP just in borrowing, not spending. It is not in building things. It is just paying interest.
Let's get back on track here. This is one of the things I have railed about over and over because I get frustrated with it. CBO keeps having to readjust its baseline. Why does it have to readjust its baseline? It readjusts because things happen: COVID happens; a war happens; 2008 happens; and Congress happens. Understand, if you and I take a look at what were our projections, we functionally have added just about—I think this all adds up to $1.39 trillion in additional spending in the baseline.
of what they have, but they are constantly having to update it because things happen in the economy; interest rates go up; and we spend money and don't pay for it.
Let's actually walk through another famous chart. Ever since the pandemic legislation—during the pandemic, we were spending about $63,000 per American citizen. Guess what. Today, that is way down. We are spending about $55,000 per American citizen, but over the next 9 years, it goes up to $66,000. If you add up all the spending, add up all the residents of the United States, citizens, $66,000 is our spend. Right now, it was $55,000. Anyone see a math problem? If you don't see the math problem—I am going to bite my tongue.
Budget deficits under current law will reach $3.1 trillion by 2036, so that is 9 budget years from now, because we are working on right now—hopefully, we are finishing and passing the 2027 stuff. This is under current law. I need you to understand how devastatingly ugly this number is, and when I show you under current policy, it is even worse.
This is 9 budget years from now. CBO last February said, hey, we are going to be borrowing $3.1 trillion that year, 2.1 of it will be just interest. So, the structural deficit will be only a trillion dollars, but on top of that, we owe $2.1 trillion in interest. Okay.
law. That means, in 9 budget years, 31 percent of every tax dollar that is paid, meaning income tax, payroll tax, and tariffs, everything coming in, in 9 budget years, 31 percent of all those tax collections will be just interest. It will be just interest, and this is on current law, assuming no wars, no pandemics, no market crashes, and no additional spending from Congress.
If you come back over here, my math says 20 percent. The chart says 19 percent. Depending what revenues are, it could be 21. That is this year. Let's just use 20 percent. This year, when you write $100, $20 of that just went to pay interest. Anyone see a problem?
Let's see. “Budget deficits under current policy will reach $4.4 trillion.” See what I am doing here. This one said the deficit—and I am sorry; this is a little awkward—in 9 budget years is $3.1 trillion under current law, but if we keep doing what we have been doing, which is we just extend current policy.
I am sorry this is geeky, but it is math. This is going to destroy the Republic. We have made it a quarter millennium, I would like this to be another American century. I would like it to be the place my 10- year-old and my now 4-year-old prosper. Hell, I would like to have a nice, quiet retirement, but in 9 budget years, it is no longer $3.1 trillion of borrowing. It is $4.4 trillion if we follow current spending policy, current baseline spending, not current baseline law. Anyone see a problem?
{time} 1930
Mr. Speaker, are we even allowed to talk about this? Because I know the armies of folks, often both at home and in our hallways here, demanding more money, telling us they are going to say mean things about us on social media unless we hand them more checks or we do things to regulate their competition. This is what this place has become. I am terrified we have hit the point where, on Twitter and X, someone saying something mean about me is now a policy override over a calculator.
uncomfortable to talk about: We have a shortage of young people in the country. It is a math problem. Look, we are only a couple ticks over zero population growth right now. There are a couple datasets out there—depending on what continues with immigration policy and a couple of other things—sometime in the next 5 years, we may actually, as a country, go slightly negative. You go, oh, good.
Remember, Medicare and Social Security are pay-as-you-go programs. I did the presentation a couple weeks ago on the Social Security actuary report. I am sure every Member of Congress pulled it out, read it, highlighted it, and noticed you had about 6 years and 3 months before the trust funds are empty.
wrong on their math, but they said in 6 years, 3 months, you get a 22 percent cut. I think it is 24 percent. If you extend that out, that is doubling senior poverty in the following year. Yay, we are going to double the number of homelessness living on the street of baby boomers. Is that moral?
Are we allowed to talk about it? Allowed to fix it? Are we allowed to do the really hard things? Guess what, Mr. Speaker. At that same time, the Medicare trust fund is also empty.
From last year to 2032, Medicare doubles in spending. It goes from 1 trillion to 2 trillion. The Medicare Part A trust fund, if you are a hospital, you take a 12-percent cut. That is the law.
Start to take a look at this. In 2025, people 0 to 18, we had 76 million people but 63 million over 65. In 9 years, we will have 70 million, so we will actually have fewer people under 18, and we will have 76 million, 65 and up. I am one of them. I am 64—yes, I am 64 with a 4-year-old. Yes, I am really optimistic about the future. I am just cranky about the math.
All right. Let's continue on this. Workers per Social Security beneficiary. We have got a problem. In 2011 we had 2.9. In 2025, last year, we had 2.7. It continues to do this. It is a little hard to do as a pay-as-you-go program.
the Social Security administrator reaches over to their special Treasury bills and say, Treasury, we are short because the payroll taxes don't cover all the checks going out the door. Give us some of our money back. That goes on and on for about another 6 years and 3 months, and then they don't have any more to cash in.
Seniors per 100 working-age adults. 2011, we had 21.9 seniors per 100 people in the labor force. Last year, it is now 32. I am just trying to pound this point in. We prefer it to be: Oh, it is horrible Democrat policy. And they say: Oh, it is a tax policy. I have already shown you the percentage of the economy that we take in in taxes has stayed remarkably stable. The economy grows so you may have a lower tax rate but, because the economy is bigger, you are still taking in the same percentages of the GDP.
U.S. population age 65 and up. 2011, we had 41 million. 2026—this is a projection for this year—we have 63 million.
Estimated share of outlays by group. I know there are a lot of bars on this chart. The punch line here is actually very simple. In about 25, maybe 26 months, over half of the Federal Government spending will go to those 65 and up.
Now, why is this important? Now, remember, think of baby boomers as large demographic quartiles. When I was a kid in the 1970s, for every dollar for seniors, there was $7 spent for those functioning under 18. That is almost reverse now. It is not really about a change in policy. It is actually a change in demographic populations.
This is really important. National defense in 9 years will take 12 percent of our spending. Seniors over 65 will take 52 percent in 9 budget years. It is just math. We know it. Hell, we knew people were going to turn 65—we knew we had a baby boom 65 years ago—actually 70- some years ago.
truth about math? Why are we afraid to tell them that often the crap that they see on this thing is fake? It is meant for you to click, get a nice dopamine hit, but it is not budget policy.
people—I think it was up in Prescott, talking about this. She was absolutely positive, if we just cut this one benefit off, we could balance the budget.
We spent a couple moments. We walked on the internet using our phones, and she saw it was like $9 billion was the total value of the benefit over a year. It did cover about a day and a quarter of borrowing—not spending, borrowing. She was devastated. It was as if I said something horrible to her.
Is that why politicians are terrified? Is that why we are terrified to actually tell the truth to our brothers and sisters? Remember, you have a country that is borrowing about $6 billion to $7 billion every day.
I started to talk about DOGE before. My economists, we helped them. I am a believer we have to have a revolution in how we provide government services: the adoption of technology, the elimination of excess positions, those things. All that has passed so far is about $7 billion in actual spending cuts that have made it through Congress, Senate, and to the President's desk for his signature.
Functionally, it barely covers one day of borrowing. How many of our folks back home get a text message every other week saying: Are you ready for your DOGE check? Just send us a couple thousand dollars, and we will send you a DOGE check. Those text messages are fraud.
The point of this is: It is just demographics. I am one of them. I am at the tail end, but I am a baby boomer. It basically means, in 9 budget years, 21.4 percent of our population will be 65 and up. We will have moved into our earned benefit years: Medicare, Social Security, military or public service retirement, whatever it is. Then you take other calculations that I am not going to geek out too much on: labor force participation, the number of our population that is actually in the labor force, and then we have a math problem.
{time} 1940
actually know what—sorry, I can't curse on the floor—know what the hell we are talking about, know the math, stop trying to sell shiny objects and things that basically are enraging but don't take down the republic?
Is this miracle of a self-governing republic worth saving? Then it is worth telling our voters and the public the truth about our demographics, the cost of financing it, and how much trouble we are actually in.
With that, Mr. Speaker, I will go back and look at all of the angry comments I am going to get because, once again, telling the truth means you get the crap kicked out of you around here. I am perfectly happy to do it.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.