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      Kennedy Vows to Cut Military Budget in Half

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      Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the independent presidential candidate, said this week that he would cut military spending by half by the end of his first term as president, and said the United States should have a reduced role in global affairs.“Military spending is a constant drain on our nation’s vitality,” Mr. Kennedy said in an hourlong speech on Wednesday evening at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library in California, adding that “obsessed with the idea of our nation’s strength, we ignore the growing infirmity at our core.”Mr. Kennedy has long assailed American military spending and defense contractors, but his speech at the Nixon Library, which partly focused on foreign policy, painted a grim picture of American decline over the last 60 years and laid out a radically different vision of America’s place on the world stage.He said the United States should accept a diminished role in global affairs, divert much of the nation’s security spending to domestic programs, and prepare for a multipolar world — where other powerful countries like China and Russia would have increased influence and America would not be the sole global superpower.“We seem to think that we’re still where we were — in the same world as in 1991,” Mr. Kennedy said, referring to the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War. He added: “We are stuck in that past. Any nation, or for that matter any individual, can maintain an illusion like that only at an ever increasing cost.”Mr. Kennedy’s vow to aggressively reduce national security spending stands in stark contrast to the trajectory of global military spending, which has reached a 35-year high, driven in part by Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Mr. Kennedy, as an independent, would also have few allies in Congress to help him fulfill that promise, and there has typically been strong support for military spending in Congress. The defense budget for 2025 is currently capped at about $895 billion, though Democrats and Republicans are mulling a further increase.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Biden Looks to Raise Taxes on Wealthy and Corporations to Shave Deficit

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      Lael Brainard, the director of the National Economic Council, said lawmakers should raise taxes on companies and the wealthiest while extending the 2017 cuts for those making less than $400,000.President Biden’s top economic adviser said on Friday that lawmakers should take advantage of a looming tax debate next year to try to reduce budget deficits by sharply raising taxes on corporations and the rich.Under that plan, Mr. Biden would more than offset the cost of maintaining tax cuts for people earning $400,000 a year or less.In a speech to the Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution in Washington, Lael Brainard, who directs the White House National Economic Council, gave the most detailed explanation yet of how Mr. Biden would seek to shape what promises to be a multitrillion-dollar tax debate.A batch of tax cuts signed into law in 2017 by former President Donald J. Trump, who is facing Mr. Biden in a rematch this fall, is set to expire at the end of next year. It includes cuts for individuals at all income levels. Republicans built that expiration into the tax bill to reduce its projected cost to deficits and comply with congressional rules.Ms. Brainard’s speech renewed Mr. Biden’s commitment to reducing taxes for middle-class Americans and for raising them on high earners. But her remarks expressed more concern about growing debt and deficits than the president and his aides had previously demonstrated when discussing the looming tax debate.“At minimum, we should avoid making the fiscal hole created by Republican tax cuts deeper, by fully paying for any tax cuts that are extended,” Ms. Brainard said, in remarks released by the White House. “And we should use the 2025 tax debate as an opportunity to meet our national needs by raising revenue overall by asking the wealthy and large corporations to pay their fair share.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Leaders Release $1.2 Trillion Spending Bill as Congress Races to Avert Shutdown

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      The bipartisan bill emerged one day before the federal funding deadline, and it was not clear whether Congress could complete it in time to avoid a partial shutdown after midnight on Friday.Top congressional negotiators in the early hours of Thursday unveiled the $1.2 trillion spending bill to fund the government through September, though it remained unclear whether Congress would be able to complete action on it in time to avert a brief partial government shutdown over the weekend.Lawmakers are racing to pass the legislation before a Friday midnight deadline in order to prevent a lapse in funds for over half the government, including the Department of Homeland Security, the Pentagon and health agencies. They are already six months behind schedule because of lengthy negotiations to resolve funding and policy disputes.Now that they have agreed on a final package, which wraps six spending bills together, passage could slip past 12:01 on Saturday morning because of a set of arcane congressional rules. House Republican leaders were signaling that they intended to hold a vote on the bill on Friday, bypassing a self-imposed rule requiring that lawmakers be given at least 72 hours to review legislation before it comes up for a vote.There could be additional hurdles in the Senate, where any one lawmaker’s objection to speedy passage of legislation could prolong debate and delay a final vote.Democrats and Republicans both highlighted victories in the painstakingly negotiated legislation. Republicans cited as victories funding for Border Patrol agents, additional detention beds run by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and a provision cutting off aid to the main United Nations agency that provides assistance to Palestinians. Democrats secured funding increases for federal child care and education programs, cancer and Alzheimer’s research.“We had to work within difficult fiscal constraints — but this bipartisan compromise will keep our country moving forward,” said Senator Patty Murray, Democrat of Washington and the chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Congressional Leaders Strike Deal on Final Spending Bill Ahead of Shutdown

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      Lawmakers resolved disputes over Department of Homeland Security funding, paving the way for an agreement. But they may still be unable to meet a Friday deadline to avert a brief partial shutdown.Congressional leaders said on Tuesday morning that they had reached an agreement on the final package of spending legislation to fund the federal government through the fall, though it was unclear whether they would be able to pass it in time to avert a brief partial shutdown over the weekend.House Republicans, Senate Democrats and the White House had been at loggerheads over funding levels for the Department of Homeland Security. For days, they had been litigating disagreements that threatened to imperil the spending package that also funds the Pentagon, the State Department and other agencies. They are facing a midnight deadline on Friday to pass the measure and avert a lapse in funding.A breakthrough on Monday night, in which Democrats and Republicans were able to agree to homeland security funding levels for the rest of the fiscal year, allowed negotiators to finalize their deal.“An agreement has been reached” that will enable Congress to fund the government through Sept. 30, Speaker Mike Johnson said in a statement. “House and Senate committees have begun drafting bill text to be prepared for release and consideration by the full House and Senate as soon as possible.”Still, the delay in striking the deal could pave the way for a brief lapse in government funding over the weekend. It will take congressional staff time to draw up text of the bill, which wraps six spending measures into a sizable piece of legislation.House Republicans have demanded that Mr. Johnson abide by an internal rule that allows lawmakers 72 hours to consider the text of a bill before they vote on it, though previous House leaders have at times abandoned that guidance.And any number of senators may create procedural hurdles for the bill’s passage and demand votes on proposed changes or object to its quick consideration. Those tactics could push final passage past 12:01 on Saturday morning, when funding is set to expire.Late last year, Mr. Johnson chopped the spending process in half, creating two partial government shutdown deadlines instead of one, in an effort to avoid asking members to take a single vote on a huge catchall to fund the entire government, which Republicans have objected to repeatedly.Earlier this month, lawmakers were able to negotiate and pass a six-bill $460 billion spending package that just barely met the first deadline on March 8, and are now repeating the process — this time haggling over funding for more politically fraught agencies — before the second deadline at the end of this week. More

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      Senate Clears $460 Billion Bill to Avert Partial Government Shutdown

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      President Biden is expected to sign the legislation, the product of a bipartisan deal, ahead of the midnight shutdown deadline — but the spending fight isn’t over yet.The Senate gave final approval on Friday to a $460 billion spending bill to fund about half the federal government through the fall, sending the legislation to President Biden’s desk with just hours to spare to avert a partial shutdown.The lopsided 75-to-22 vote cemented a resolution to at least part of a spending stalemate that consumed Congress for months and has repeatedly pushed the government to the edge of shutdown. Mr. Biden was expected to sign it ahead of a midnight deadline to keep federal funding flowing.But top lawmakers were still negotiating spending bills for the other half of the government over the same period, including for the Pentagon, which Congress must pass by March 22 to avert a shutdown. Several thorny issues, including funding for the Department of Homeland Security, have yet to be resolved.The legislation passed on Friday packages together six spending bills, extending funding through Sept. 30 for dozens of federal programs covering agriculture, energy and the environment, transportation, housing, the Justice Department and veterans.“To folks who worry that divided government means nothing ever gets done, this bipartisan package says otherwise,” said Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader. “It helps parents and veterans and firefighters and farmers and school cafeterias and more.”The package adheres to the funding levels negotiated last year by Mr. Biden and the House speaker at the time, Kevin McCarthy, keeping spending on domestic programs essentially flat — even as funding for veterans’ programs continues to grow — while allowing military spending to increase slightly.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump’s Tax Cut Fueled Investment but Did Not Pay for Itself, Study Finds

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      The most detailed research yet on corporate response to the 2017 Republican tax law shows modest gains for workers and high cost to the federal debt.The corporate tax cuts that President Donald J. Trump signed into law in 2017 have boosted investment in the U.S. economy and delivered a modest pay bump for workers, according to the most rigorous and detailed study yet of the law’s effects.Those benefits are less than Republicans promised, though, and they have come at a high cost to the federal budget. The corporate tax cuts came nowhere close to paying for themselves, as conservatives insisted they would. Instead, they are adding more than $100 billion a year to America’s $34 trillion-and-growing national debt, according to the quartet of researchers from Princeton University, the University of Chicago, Harvard University and the Treasury Department.The researchers found the cuts delivered wage gains that were “an order of magnitude below” what Trump officials predicted: about $750 per worker per year on average over the long run, compared to promises of $4,000 to $9,000 per worker.The study is the first to use vast data from corporate tax filings to draw conclusions about the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which passed with only Republican support. Its findings could help shape debate on renewing parts of the law that are set to expire or have begun to phase out.That includes a key provision targeting investment, which the authors identify as the most cost-effective corporate cut. That benefit, which allowed companies to immediately deduct investment spending from their income taxes, would be renewed as part of a bipartisan tax bill that passed the House in January.It also challenges narratives about the bill on both sides of the aisle. Democrats have claimed the tax cuts only rewarded shareholders and did not help the economy. Republicans have called them a cost-free boon to the middle class. Both appear to have been wrong.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Johnson Floats Short-Term Spending Bill to Avert Partial Shutdown

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      The Republican speaker, who has come under bipartisan pressure to strike a deal that his far-right members are resisting, is weighing a temporary funding patch that would allow more time for negotiations.Speaker Mike Johnson is floating another short-term stopgap spending bill to head off a partial government shutdown at the end of the week, offering a temporary path out of a stalemate that has repeatedly threatened federal funding over the past six months.His proposal would extend funding for some government agencies for a week, through March 8, and the rest for another two weeks, until March 22. It would be contingent on congressional leaders finalizing an emerging bipartisan agreement on six of the 12 annual spending bills.And it would leave time for top lawmakers to negotiate the other six measures, and then try to pass the spending bills individually before the next set of deadlines to fund the government. That would be a tall order in the House, which has struggled to pass spending legislation amid Republican divisions.Any stopgap bill “would be part of a larger agreement to finish a number of appropriations bills, ensuring adequate time for drafting text and for members to review prior to casting votes,” said Athina Lawson, a spokeswoman for Mr. Johnson.Congressional leaders hoped to finalize the plan as early as Wednesday, leaving time for quick votes in both chambers before the midnight deadline on Friday.The details were reported earlier by Punchbowl News.The proposal offers glimmers of hope for staving off a shutdown in the immediate term, but would only punt resolution of a spending stalemate that has gripped Congress for months, as Republicans bent on steep cuts and conservative policy mandates refuse to accept a deal with Democrats. It comes after a meeting at the White House on Tuesday in which President Biden and congressional leaders from both parties escalated pressure on Mr. Johnson to accept a spending deal. Top Democrats and Republicans emerged saying they were optimistic about keeping the government funded.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Spending Impasse Persists Amid G.O.P. Resistance as Partial Shutdown Looms

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      With Republicans insisting on adding right-wing policy measures to spending bills, lawmakers are running out of time to strike a deal to avert a partial government shutdown before a deadline of Friday at midnight.Congressional leaders have failed to reach a deal on legislation to keep federal funding going past Friday, with Republicans insisting on adding right-wing policy dictates to the spending bills, pushing the government to the brink of a partial shutdown within days.Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader, said on Sunday that despite “intense discussions” that were continuing among top lawmakers to break the impasse, Republican recalcitrance was raising the prospect of a “disruptive shutdown” at midnight on Friday.“While we had hoped to have legislation ready this weekend that would give ample time for members to review the text, it is clear now that House Republicans need more time to sort themselves out,” Mr. Schumer said in a letter to Democratic senators. “With the uncertainty of how the House will pass the appropriations bills and avoid a shutdown this week, I ask all senators to keep their schedules flexible, so we can work to ensure a pointless and harmful lapse in funding doesn’t occur.”With no sign of a breakthrough, President Biden summoned congressional leaders to the White House on Tuesday to discuss the spending legislation, as well as the $95 billion foreign aid package for Ukraine and Israel that the Senate passed earlier this month, which Speaker Mike Johnson has refused to take up.But the more immediate task was to keep government spending from lapsing this week.Three consecutive times over the last six months, Congress has relied on short-term, stopgap spending bills passed by a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers to keep government spending flowing, essentially punting on a longer-term agreement for several weeks at a time. Each time, the Republican speaker — first Kevin McCarthy, then Mr. Johnson — has promised hard-right lawmakers that they would try to win more spending cuts and conservative policy conditions on how federal money could be spent during the next round of negotiations.Now, with patience wearing thin among ultraconservatives, pressure is mounting on Mr. Johnson, whose members want him to secure major cuts and policy changes that have no chance of enactment with Democrats in control of the Senate and White House. Lawmakers in the House, which has been out of session for the past week, are set to return to Washington on Wednesday, just two days before a deadline on Friday to fund military construction, agriculture, transportation and housing programs.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More