Senator Bernie Sanders, ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, has called on the panel’s chairman to schedule public hearings on Trump’s budget.
In a letter to Senate Budget Committee Chairman Mike Enzi, Sanders expressed serious concerns that the committee had not scheduled a single hearing on the president’s preliminary budget request.
“In my view, President Trump’s budget includes unacceptably painful cuts to programs that senior citizens, children, persons with disabilities and working people rely on to feed their families, heat their homes, put food on the table and educate their children,” Sanders wrote to Enzi.
Sanders also pointed out that Congress will need to complete the Fiscal Year 2018 budget resolution in less than three weeks, a deadline which he believes “couldn’t possibly” be met.
“It is incumbent upon us to start scheduling hearings on the budget as soon as possible,” Sanders wrote.
In recent days, Sanders has labelled Donald Trump’s budget “morally repugnant” and has hit out at budget director Mick Mulvaney’s claim that his budget was “compassionate.”
You can read Sanders’ full letter to Enzi here.
