WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Roger Wicker, R-Miss., ranking member on the Senate Armed Services Committee, today released the following statement in response to President Biden’s Fiscal Year 2024 budget request which proposes significant new taxes and fails to invest adequately in national defense.

“President Biden’s budget proves that his priorities are increasingly out of touch with reality. A $2 trillion tax hike would be a wet blanket for our economy and cost jobs. His so-called deficit reduction plan is a cynical ploy to distract from his Administration’s inflationary tax and spending sprees,” Wicker said. “This budget has no chance of becoming reality.”

As the lead Republican on the Armed Services Committee, Wicker also commented on President Biden’s defense budget request.

“The President’s defense budget is woefully inadequate and disappointing. It does not even resource his own National Defense Strategy to protect our country from growing threats around the world. This defense budget is a serious indication of President Biden’s failure to prioritize national security,” Wicker said.

Accounting for inflation, the President has now asked Congress to cut military spending for three years in a row, despite a worsening threat environment. Wicker, along with overwhelming bipartisan majorities in Congress, has voted twice now to override the President’s defense budget and align it with the United States’ national strategy.

In his previous work on national defense issues, Wicker has:

• Called for sustained and significant growth in our national defense investment at a minimum rate of 5 percent above inflation.
• Repeatedly challenged senior flag and general officers to articulate the readiness challenges facing their forces and request the full set of capabilities they need to improve their posture.
• Encouraged efforts on a bipartisan basis to fully arm allies in Taiwan and Ukraine to prevent future aggression from America’s chief adversaries – China and Russia.