United States Senate contender Republican Mark Neumann revealed his budget plans Wednesday, criticizing President Barack Obama’s current budget and calling on other candidates in the Senate race to release their own plans.
Neumann’s five year plans cut spending by $1.36 trillion, repeal Obama’s health care law and permanently extend former President George W. Bush’s tax cuts. Neumann is currently running for the soon-to-be vacant Senate seat of Democrat Herb Kohl.
“The trajectory of this debt for our nation is unsustainable. I don’t think there’s any business person that would look at this and say we could continue going the direction we are going,” Neumann said. “Bottom line, we have two directions we’re going: We can spend more money, like Obama and Baldwin suggest, or we can be government that spends less and is smaller.”
Neumann did not release exact numbers on where the cuts would come from, but did release a list of more than 150 programs that would face elimination or reduced funding under his budget. Some of the cuts include eliminating ethanol subsidies, ending the Troubled Asset Relief Program and reducing the non-defense federal workforce by 15 percent.
Neumann said the three key issues in spending were Social Security, Medicare and defense.
When asked about a Medicare proposal by Congressman Paul Ryan, Neumann said Ryan has done a phenomenal job of bringing the Medicare issue to the forefront of the American people.
“Paul’s plan deals with the big picture long term; I have a fear we’re near the edge of a cliff,” Neumann said. “Not 10 or 20 years down the road but at some point in the next five years we’re going to reach a crisis point.”
On the issue of national defense, Neumann said defense should be the No. 1 priority of the federal government. He said while there were savings to be found, his No. 1 priority would be keeping the country first in the world on defense.
When asked about the political reality of passing his proposed budget, Neumann said it was possible and said he would be willing to compromise as long as it was outside the numbers in his plan.
Polling released by the Rasmussen Reports on Tuesday showed Neumann beating U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin, D-Madison, 46 percent to 37 percent in the race for Senate.
Former Gov. Tommy Thompson polled even better than Neumann against Baldwin, beating her 50 percent to 36 percent. Assembly Speaker Jeff Fitzgerald, R-Horicon, defeated Baldwin 41 to 40 percent.
University of Wisconsin political science professor Donald Downs said Neumann is more of a card-carrying Republican than Thompson and that the difference between Fitzgerald and Neumann was a bit harder to tell.
“I think it’s possible that Neumann and Thompson may split the vote for Thompson,” said Downs, who is a Badger Herald adviser. “We saw the same thing happen to Romney, who’s been helped by Gingrich, Paul and Santorum who split the vote and made him look stronger than he might be otherwise.”
When asked what direction the state may swing in an election between Baldwin and Neumann, Downs said Baldwin is to the left as much as Neumann is to the right, which makes it very hard to predict.
