Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., told Newsmax TV on Tuesday the federal budget has ballooned to an unmanageable size, and recommended the Environmental Protection Agency should "be a state-run program," not a federal agency.
President Donald Trump's recently proposed $4.8 trillion 2021 fiscal plan slashed funding for the EPA and other domestic programs in an effort to balance the budget.
"Washington has a spending problem," Steube told Tuesday's "American Agenda." "I campaigned on it before I got elected, and we need to really reign in our deficit. We are now at $23 trillion. Last year alone, we put almost a trillion dollars on the deficit."
He warned, "if we don't start paying down our deficit" by 2021, "just our interest payments on the debt alone will surpass health, [Department of Justice, Department of Veterans Affairs,] and NASA's budget combined, so we absolutely need to look at that."
The congressman went on to blame Democrats for the spending before recommending some programs "absolutely" need to be cut.
He said the EPA "in my opinion should be a state-run program. We shouldn't have a federal EPA dishing out federal policy; it should be at the state level. Those are the type of things that can be done at the state level, and so we absolutely need to cut our spending here in Washington."
Steube said, at the federal level, funding should focus on defense and homeland security.
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Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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