The Associated Press could barely contain its excitement this week when it reported details of President Joe Biden’s $3.5 trillion social-spending bill.
“President Joe Biden’s ‘build back better’ agenda is poised to be the most far-reaching federal investment since FDR’s New Deal or LBJ’s Great Society — a prodigious effort to tax the rich and shift money into projects and programs touching the lives of nearly every American,” the news outlet reported.
This isn’t a news report. This is a White House press release. With news articles such as this, who even needs a press secretary?
For fun, let’s take a look at the AP’s recent reporting on Republican-sponsored spending bills.
Last year, after the GOP announced a $1.4 trillion bill following the November 2020 presidential election, the AP was careful to tie the measure to then-President Donald Trump’s defeat.
“GOP unveils $1.4T spending bill amid post-election turmoil,” read the headline. Its opening line read: “Republicans controlling the Senate unveiled a government-wide, $1.4 trillion spending bill on Tuesday, a largely bipartisan measure that faces uncertain odds during this period of post-election tumult in Washington.”
Later that same year, when the Republican-controlled Senate sent a $900 billion pandemic relief bill to Trump’s desk, the AP rolled out the following headline, “Too big to read: Giant bill a leap of faith for Congress.”
“The $900 billion pandemic relief package that was rushed through Congress Monday created a familiar year-end conundrum for lawmakers: It was a bill too big to fail and also too big to read,” the report read.
In 2019, after the Democratic-controlled House voted 305-102 to pass an immigration bill drafted in the Republican-held Senate, a bill that was opposed mostly by a small minority of far-left Democrats, the AP framed the story thus: “House sends Trump $4.6B border bill, yielding to Senate.”
In 2018, after the Republican-led House voted 220-191 to expand a GOP-drafted tax reform bill, which boosted refunds for all taxpayers, the AP reported, “House passes GOP bill to make new tax cuts permanent.”
The news wire also worried, “The sweeping rewrite of the tax code that Republicans hustled through Congress late last year, signed into law by Trump as his signature legislative achievement, is expected to add about $1.5 trillion to the deficit over 10 years.”
Also in 2018, following the passage of the Trump White House’s tax reform and spending bill, the AP, which assures us Biden’s $3.5 trillion proposal will benefit programs that touch “the lives of nearly every American,” sounded the alarm.
“Analysis: Tax cuts, spending to raise deficit to $1T by 2020,” the AP said.
“The combined effect of President Donald Trump’s tax cuts and last month’s budget-busting spending bill is sending the federal deficit toward the $1 trillion mark next year,” it reported, adding, “Republicans once laced into President Barack Obama for trillion-dollar-plus deficits but mostly fell quiet on Monday’s news.”
It’d be a good “gotcha” if the AP was at least consistent in its worries about overspending.
Earlier, in 2017, when the Republican tax reform bill passed, the AP reported, “Triumphant Trump celebrates tax win, but some fear backlash.”
“A triumphant President Donald Trump and jubilant fellow Republicans celebrated the passage of their $1.5 trillion tax overhaul Wednesday as a ‘historic victory for the American people,’” it said. “The American people, however, will need some convincing.”
There’s more, but you obviously get the picture. Republican bills are dangerous, unpopular, and self-serving, according to the AP. In contrast, Biden’s enormous multitrillion-dollar proposal, which is chock full of every imaginable left-wing goodie, is a “far-reaching investment” that will benefit everyone.
