Dear Friends,   The federal government’s foremost responsibility is funding the essential services we rely on every day—from Social Security and Medicare to the postal service and emergency response. To do that, the federal government needs to pay its bills.   President Biden gets it. The budget he delivered to Congress this week will cut federal deficits by nearly $3 trillion over 10 years. It builds on the Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and invests in programs that make a real difference to all Americans lives: extending Medicare for 25 years and lowering health care costs for beneficiaries.   Unfortunately, the current House Majority would rather cut essential programs and shield ultra-rich individuals and wealthy corporations from paying their fair share of taxes. Even more alarming are the persistent threats to play chicken over raising the debt ceiling. As a member of the Budget Committee and someone who served on the Budget Committee during the 2011 debt-ceiling crisis, I know that the consequences of defaulting on our debt would be catastrophic. In particular as our economy recovers from the havoc of tax cuts put into place by the Trump administration and the devastation of the COVID-19 pandemic.   This is a better alternative to the draconian fiscal policies proposed by the House Majority. The President’s proposal is a strong starting point for budget negotiations in Congress. However, there are other, common sense proposals we should implement to reduce the deficit and support our economic recovery:    1. End wasteful spending on nuclear weapons We can save money and support global security by ending the production of new nuclear weapons and scaling down the so-called “modernization” of old weapons, which is essentially an expansion of our existing nuclear arsenal. These disastrous weapons will never be the answer to solving our complex and ever-changing national security threats.  We should not be investing tens of billions of dollars annually on an outdated and irresponsible nuclear arsenal. 2. Save on agriculture subsidies For decades, the federal government has spent trillions subsidizing industrial agriculture operations at the expense of small and mid-sized independent farmers. This is not only expensive, but detrimental to our nation’s health. Just six crops—corn, rice, wheat, soy, cotton, and peanuts—receive 94% of all federal agricultural farm subsidies. Over half of all federal payments go just eight states with massive agri-business industries. If we instead redirect these funds to independent farmers who place value over volume, we will not just save money but give working families healthier options at the grocery store.   3. Cut the defense budget  If we want to get serious about reducing the deficit, we need not look further than our bloated defense budget which accounts for about half of all discretionary spending each year. There are common sense cuts we can make to save money while still having the strongest military in the world. Take for example spending billions of dollars each year to maintain military ships that no longer work. This is just one of many costly policies that Republicans refuse to examine despite purporting they want to cut costs.   4. End oil and gas subsidies  Forcing taxpayers to subsize the fossil fuel industry while many in the House Majority are calling to cut spending on education, health care and other critical social services is just plain wrong. The federal government could save tens of billions of dollars ending once and for all the practice of giving hands outs to Big Oil.   5. Allow Medicare to further negotiate the price of prescription drugs   The Inflation Reduction Act made history by finally allowing Medicare to negotiate the price of prescription drugs, starting with the ten most expensive prescriptions. We need to build on this progress and allow Medicare to negotiate the cost of all prescription drugs—just like private insurance companies—and save money for beneficiaries and the federal government.   These are just a handful of solutions to balance the budget and pay the federal government’s bills on time. Let’s get to work on crafting a balanced federal budget that helps Americans, not hurts them.