Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Wednesday said that Democrats are aiming to reverse many of the hard-fought gains President Donald Trump has achieved by reining in President Joe Biden’s historic levels of deficit spending.
“The budget deficit began to shrink dramatically beginning in the second quarter of this year when there was no overlap with the Biden administration. From April to September, the cumulative deficit totaled just $468 billion. This is the lowest reading since 2019 and is down nearly 40 percent from the comparable period last year when Biden was spending recklessly,” Bessent wrote on X, sharing a chart detailing that Trump now has the lowest post-coronavirus pandemic budget deficit.
He added, “Today, President Trump is putting the U.S. financial system on solid footing. Revenues are soaring and government spending is under control. Democrats think they can undo the important progress the President has made by shutting down the government. But they will not succeed.”
While many have focused on the Trump administration’s ability to raise revenue — Bessent has said that the United States could raise $300 billion in revenue this year — the Trump administration has also worked to bring federal spending under control after years of runaway spending under Biden.
A Treasury analysis found that in the three months April to June, the first full quarter of Trump’s second term in office, government outlays increased by 0.2 percent. This represents a much smaller increase compared to the previous four full quarters.
In the third quarter this year, spending decreased by 2.5 percent compared to last year.
Bessent wrote that the year-over-year percent change in government spending has dropped drastically. Ahead of the 2024 presidential election, federal outlays were up roughly 30 percent from four quarters prior. The rampant spending under Biden essentially saddled Trump with a large fiscal deficit for his first fiscal year.
“We are going to be in much better shape than people think,” assured Joe Lavorgna, economic counsellor to U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
“Most of the time people come in and think it’s business as usual, but there’s no question that the Trump administration has made rapid progress on tariffs.”
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) found that Trump’s tariffs would lower the deficit by $4 trillion over the next ten years.
Bessent has aimed to bring the deficit down to three percent by the end of Trump’s term.
“What people are missing is the fact that much of the improvement in this year’s fiscal deficit has happened from April onwards,” Lavorgna remarked.
“On the revenue side, we’re getting a lot more from tariffs. More importantly is that spending isn’t growing as quickly,” he explained.
The Trump administration’s progress on tackling the deficit strikes a stark contrast compared to Democrat spending proposals.
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