FREEDOMWORKS 02/03/2015

1. Obama's Latest Budget Proposal Shows a Weak Grasp on Reality - by Josh Withrow With another year comes another federal budget season, kicked off by President Obama’s budget proposal. Although his plan was shockingly delivered by the date required by law (for only the second time under Obama), perhaps the president and his team should have taken a few extra days to think it through. The proposal they released today is so shockingly tone-deaf and immune to fiscal realities that it would be comic if we weren’t talking about the actual future solvency of the United States government. To start with, the base spending numbers under Obama’s budget once again blow past the spending caps signed into law by President Obama under the Budget Control Act of 2011. The White House plan calls for nearly $4 trillion in spending next year ($3.999 trillion, but who’s counting?). Of course, a spending plan this bloated requires revenue in the form of a massive, $2.1 trillion tax hike over ten years. Read more here... 2. Obama's $4 Trillion Budget Joke  President Obama released his latest budget, a plan that would spend $4 trillion next year and $50 trillion over the next decade. The plan is packed with goodies from free community college to free preschool to increased infrastructure spending. The budget blows past the spending caps that Obama signed into law in 2011. While Obama says that his budget stops the growth of the national debt, the growth is only stopped in relation to the GDP, meaning the actual dollar value of the deficit will go back to growing every year starting in 2018. By his own math, this would cause the national debt to reach over $26 trillion by 2025. Read more here... 3. Capitol Hill Update, February 2, 2015 - by Josh Withrow House & Senate/Schedule: Both the House and Senate are in this week and will remain in D.C. until the week of February 16th. Legislative Highlight of the Week: On Tuesday, the House will vote to fully repeal ObamaCare. H.R. 596, sponsored by Rep. Bradley Byrne (R-AL), would both repeal ObamaCare in its entirety and instruct various House committees to produce patient-centered reforms to replace the law after it's repealed. The main importance of this vote is stating once more the Republican commitment to repealing (rather than merely attempting to tinker with) the president's unworkable and unaffordable takeover of health care. Read more here... 4. The Fourth Amendment is NOT a Useless Piece of Paper - by Michael Greibrok This title was adopted from a line by Justice Sotomayor during the recent Supreme Court oral arguments in Rodriguez v. United States. Over time there has been an encroachment on our Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches, as Justice Sotomayor also said, “. . . we can’t keep bending the Fourth Amendment to the resources of law enforcement.” It is time for the courts to push back and protect our constitutional rights. Fortunately, two recent cases, one at the Supreme Court and another at the circuit level, have given great opportunities to do just this. Read more here... 5. The REINS Act Will Keep Unelected Federal Bureaucrats Accountable to Congress - by Jason Pye The Constitution makes explicitly clear that Congress is delegated as the lawmaking branch of the federal government. But, over time, lawmakers have abdicated this responsibility by passing laws that delegate the regulatory process to unelected, largely unaccountable bureaucrats in the executive branch. This has led to presidents enacting their agendas through executive fiat, especially in times of divided government. Read more here... 6. Audit the Fed Bill May Land on Obama's Desk This Year - by Julie Borowski Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) has reintroduced the Federal Reserve Transparency Act of 2015 (S.264) along with 30 bipartisan cosponsors. Better known as “Audit the Fed”, the bill would require a full and thorough audit of the Federal Reserve. "A complete and thorough audit of the Fed will finally allow the American people to know exactly how their money is being spent by Washington. The Fed's currently operates under a cloak of secrecy and it has gone on for too long. The American people have a right to know what the Federal Reserve is doing with our nation's money supply. The time to act is now," Sen. Paul said in a press release. Read more here... 7. 5 Reasons to Oppose Common Core 8. Grassroots Will Make School Choice a Reality - by Ted Abram After more than 20 years of experimentation and intense debate, Americans favor school choice. A national survey by Beck Research shows 69% of Americans support school choice, including 60% of Democrats. Americans have come to realize what Kevin Chavous, a former D.C. city councilman, recently articulated: Read more here... In Liberty, Jackie Bodnar Director of Communications, FreedomWorks