Tyler Evilsizer

Numbers wizard for @SenateBudget: tax nerd, budget wonk. Formerly at @BudgetHawks & @MoneyInPolitics. In DC for now, permanent Montanan. Thoughts are my own.

[Tyler Evilsizer @TylerEvilsizer]

In other words, Musk has given up on spending cuts and wants to solve the budget deficit 100% by increasing revenue

[Sawyer Merritt @SawyerMerritt]

Elon Musk in new upcoming interview says AI and robots will need to fix the deficit:

"There's no way we were gonna solve the deficit from within the government. The only way we're going to solve the national debt is with AI and robots. We're not gonna solve it by trying to save our way there. The appetite to cut spending is not there at the presidency, the House, the Senate or the judiciary. Basically, no one in authority in the government whatsoever — with maybe a few rare exceptions.

Maybe if the president made that his primary goal, we could do that. If you try to solve the deficit and stop wasteful spending, you make a lot of enemies. President Trump likes to be liked. He doesn't like people calling him, being upset about ... some funding being stopped.

I kinda got carried away, basically and was gone for too long from my companies. What I should have done was be more in the background ... and probably only had it last for a month or two. I should have gone back and focused on AI a little sooner than I did."

The full podcast interview with Walter Isaacson drops this Tuesday.

[Tyler Evilsizer @TylerEvilsizer]

@George_A_Callas Incredible, congrats!

[Tyler Evilsizer @TylerEvilsizer]

@George_A_Callas Seems like a red herring.

$200-$600b is lost in unrealized cap gain revenue (JCT/TF)

Buy, Borrow, Die being a small fraction doesn't shrink the case to tax gains once.

That's like saying "foreign aid is a small part of spending so there's no justification to cut entitlements"

[Tyler Evilsizer @TylerEvilsizer]

@George_A_Callas @MarcGoldwein @KClausing @NatashaRSarin OBBBA had full expensing and lowered the cost of capital, yet it still had a negative dynamic effect.

Inversely, a deficit-reducing tax package could be positive (or at least neutral) on growth). That's not a new finding from CBO/JCT but today's high debt levels make it easier

[Senate Budget Democrats @SenateBudget]

🧵Donald Trump is a con man.

From his time on the campaign trail to present day, he continues to tell the American people lie after lie.

These are 11 of his most harmful, costly broken promises. https://t.co/QbXdTCE22L

[Jessica Riedl 🧀 🇺🇦 @JessicaBRiedl]

JD Vance scapegoating immigrants as usual. Illegal immigrants contribute $26 billion annually in Social Security taxes. Yet they are ineligible for benefits and no investigation has turned up widespread fraudulent Social Security benefits collected by them.

[Tyler Evilsizer @TylerEvilsizer]

@George_A_Callas @WaysMeansCmte It's also just a couple months of war spending, compared to 1-year of ACA subsidies.

Trump's full 1-year defense increase (~$500-550 billion) is more than 10 years of ACA.

[Senator Jeff Merkley @SenJeffMerkley]

A pocket rescission is an illegal line item veto.

It is the president saying that he and he alone will convert a bipartisan spending bill (that has been signed into law) into a partisan spending bill.

He is canceling the lines of spending he doesn't like.

This violates the core separation of powers embedded in our constitution in which it is the Congress, not the president, who decides what programs are designed and at what level they are funded.

Republican colleagues said they would never let this happen. Well here it is.

They should ask themselves: "How would I like to have a Democratic president canceling out the Republican flavored programs he or she doesn't like in a bipartisan spending bill that has been signed into law?"

If they have any integrity or any spine, they will join us in ending this practice.
https://t.co/MSFwxD0w6F

[Senate Budget Democrats @SenateBudget]

Once again, Trump and Vought have violated the law by sending Congress more illegal pocket rescissions. Republicans need to stand up to Trump and affirm that cancelling funding Congress has approved is ILLEGAL.

The law is not a suggestion, and the President is not a king.

[Senate Budget Democrats @SenateBudget]

🚨These numbers are a FIVE-ALARM fire for every member of Congress: a 1% jump in interest rates adds $39 TRILLION to our national debt.

But there's a path forward—it starts with reversing Republicans’ tax breaks for billionaires.

https://t.co/4I4HneTkqd

[Brendan Duke 🇨🇦🇺🇸 @Brendan_Duke]

Two points here:

1.) IRA prescription drug provisions not saving as much as projected is mostly the result of Medicare Part D reforms on stuff like coinsurance costing more than projected as opposed to, say, drug negotiations not working.

(Author of this makes this clear btw)

[Senate Budget Democrats @SenateBudget]

He's not kidding. Trump has a pattern of withholding federal funding based on states that did or didn't vote for Republicans.

It's all right here:

[Brendan Duke 🇨🇦🇺🇸 @Brendan_Duke]

This is egregiously wrong--it's trying to pass off a values choice as a mathematical certainty.

You absolutely can fix Social Security's shortfall w/ payroll tax increases alone. Whether you *should* is something people w/ different values can debate, but the headline is false.

[Senate Budget Democrats @SenateBudget]

Despite their lectures on fiscal responsibility, Republicans repeatedly ran up debt with endless wars and tax cuts for the rich.

Stabilizing our debt is an essential step to investing in what families really want: housing, health care, and education.

[Brendan Duke 🇨🇦🇺🇸 @Brendan_Duke]

The deficit is essentially tied for 2nd as the Republicans' worst issue after health care.

It seems like a $4.5 trillion tax cut partially financed by cuts to health care/SNAP and partially financed by deficits with interest rates now soaring was a bad idea.

[Alex Jacquez @AlexSJacquez]

Let's check the tape:

[Erica York @ericadyork]

Let’s review.

In February 2025 Trump floated $5,000 DOGE dividends. Didn’t happen.

In November 2025, he said we’d be getting $2,000 tariff dividends. Didn’t happen.

Now in September 2026 we’re being promised another $5,000 tariff dividend. Not gonna happen.

[Senate Budget Democrats @SenateBudget]

In April, Russ Vought promised to follow the law and provide debt and deficit projections in OMB’s mid-session review.

The review is out, but the projections are nowhere to be found.

He doesn’t want to confirm what we already know: Trump’s Big, Ugly Bill blew up the deficit.

[Tyler Evilsizer @TylerEvilsizer]

@George_A_Callas Seems like a solvable problem and not a reason to oppose the cap increase. The most prominent proposal to raise the cap (the Social Security Expansion Act) solves by combining the Trust Funds

[Senate Budget Democrats @SenateBudget]

NEW OP-ED from @SenJeffMerkley: We need to get serious about getting our deficits under control.

Doing so means that we will be able to grow our economy, invest for the future and reduce costs for families by investing in the programs they need to thrive.
https://t.co/2eln9eoNhz