
Every president increases the debt at least somewhat during their term, at least since 2000. However the difference is that Trump has grown the debt this quickly without any real justification. Obama had to increase it to recover the economy from the 2008 recession, Biden had to increase it to pay for his COVID response and attempts to revive the economy during the pandemic. Trump has grown the debt just to pay for tariffs that were struck down and had to be refunded, a war that is…
… completely unnecessary and pointless, and on renovations to the White House and other structures for no reason, just to funnel public funds to his business associates. The debt has been blown up over his ego, not because he’s doing anything to help the country, its people, or even the economy.
It’s a complicated answer. It includes countless different entities that the government has borrowed money from. American citizens, organizations, investors, and some foreign organizations. In general though it’s not about who the debt is owed to, but instead the issue is the fact that the US has accumulated so much debt that it could never pay back in full. So much public money goes to just paying the interest. Money that could’ve gone to social services or anything else. That’s the problem.
I wouldn’t say stupid but misled. I used to be sorta a Republican but that was when I was 16 and watching the “owning SJW Ben Shapiro” BS. We’re in a different time. I feel like a lot of issues Republicans feel strongly about like abortion, “wokeness,” and even immigration to a degree are distractions to separate people from the real issues facing our society.
It would’ve hit it decades from now if it weren’t for his reckless spending. You’re drawing a false equivalent between presidents, using public funds for actual purposes versus funneling money to their corrupt billionaire friends. No president has been good but acting like Trump is no different from the previous ones on this issue, is purposefully, ignorant and wrong.
I also went down the alt right pipeline at that age. I’d argue there stupid because those of us with working brains saw it for what it was and grew out of that nonsense. I don’t give excuses to grown adults for being misled when it doesn’t take a strong reasoning ability to see why the republican platform and track record is far from anything that benefits the people of this country, especially with ice rounding people up on the streets.
Did I say he paid off the national debt? No, but facts are facts. Just because it doesn’t fit the narrative one might want to push, doesn’t mean we get to ignore the fact that it happened. Also even if you want to downplay the surplus as not contributing to paying off the national debt, that still ignores the fact that it caused a zero dollar increase to the National debt, which is trillions of dollars less than Trump has had in any of his years as president. Do you have any actual rebuttal?
But then again no Republican will do that only a Democratic IF they even do. I feel like Democrats tend to also give lip service but when push comes to serve don’t actually do anything. Maybe I didn’t follow the news as carefully but I feel like Biden didn’t actually do much at all? He passed the infrastructure bill which was good?
I made an oversight, a minor one. I don’t think it’s as compelling as you think it is. One year surplus on the heels of welfare reform, which Democrats are now opposed to, and a republican Congress. And that’s not even digging into the budgetary jujutsu they did to simply pass the debt onto the following year to claim they had a surplus. Ultimately not a penny went to repay our debt under Clinton. There has been a systematic failure by both parties.