Republicans have a lot of work to do to make President Donald Trump's massive policy bill "acceptable," Sen. Ted Budd, R-N.C., told Newsmax on Wednesday.
"I mean, how about taking 1.4 million people that are on Medicaid that aren't even in our country legally," he said on "Carl Higbie FRONTLINE."
"People that are registered in more than one state at a time. I think we can get to those things. What about somebody that's at home and not even trying to go to work to get them to go to work? I mean, those are simple things we can do, which will get us well on the way to fixing this problem."
Lawmakers must also "take spending seriously," Budd said.
"That's what it all comes down to. People are, you know, this is a big problem now, but it's a worse problem later. So, we've got to deal with spending. We've got to get this under control. We know that this country went crazy under [former President] Joe Biden during the COVID era. We can't have this perpetuate because it will destroy us.
"I mean, when you're spending more on keeping you, when you're spending more on the interest, like I mentioned earlier than you are on our defense, that's just wrong. So. we can't let this get worse. We have to deal with that spending right now."
On whether he will vote yes on the bill, Budd said: "I don't know of anybody who's a yes right now. That's why, I mean, thank God for our Founding Fathers and what they set up.
"We got to do a whole lot of work on it to get this thing to where most of us can pass it with a yes. We want to get to yes. We want to save Americans from the largest tax increase in American history. But we've got a lot of work before we're all a yes."
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Solange Reyner ✉
Solange Reyner is a writer and editor for Newsmax. She has more than 15 years in the journalism industry reporting and covering news, sports and politics.
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