President Trump's pledge to reduce the federal deficit isn't exactly working out.
The federal deficit has jumped from $779 billion in fiscal year 2018 to $984 billion in 2019, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin revealed in a Friday statement. That's a 26 percent jump, and the deficit's highest point since it was coming down from the recession in 2012.
The deficit saw a massive jump as the recession kicked in from 2008 to 2009, and that number hasn't been replicated since. Still, the deficit has purely been on upward swing under Trump, and has only increased more dramatically since the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act was passed. The GOP tax package was expected to help push the deficit over $1 trillion by 2020, and now, that looks unavoidable.
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That deficit growth completely bucks the several times Trump has promised to cut the federal deficit and national debt.
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