GOP Chair's Take on Trump Budget: No Hearing Necessary

President Trump released his 2021 budget on Monday to great fanfare, but don't expect to hear much about it in terms of Senate debate. The chair of the Senate Budget Committee says he won't even schedule a hearing on it because the document is essentially meaningless, reports the Hill. That isn't an anti-Trump slam: Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming gave the same treatment to former President Obama. His rationale is that any related hearing is a waste of time and turns into a "diatribe against the president," reports Politico.

"I want to encourage people ... not to waste any time searching out the president's budget cuts," Enzi told his fellow senators in a floor speech. "Congress doesn't pay any attention to the president's budget exercise. It's all it is—an exercise. Congress holds the purse strings, according to the Constitution, and Congress is very protective of that constitutional authority." Among other things, Trump's $4.8 trillion blueprint calls for a big outlay in military spending, including the creation of a new submarine-launched nuclear warhead, reports the New York Times. (More President Trump stories.)