Sen. Kamala D. Harris (Calif.) may have been the breakout winner of this week’s Democratic presidential debates, but there was one clear loser: the American taxpayer. These were the most expensive presidential debates in American history. Never have so many candidates proposed to spend so much.
But no one asked any of the candidates a simple question: How much is all of that going to cost?
Instead of shoring up Medicare, whose hospital insurance trust fund will be depleted by 2026, Democrats want to expand it to cover virtually everyone in the country. Sanders’s Medicare-for-all legislation has been co-sponsored by Warren, Harris, Cory Booker (N.J.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (N.Y.). Nonpartisan estimates put its cost at $32 trillion over the first 10 years.
Or take free college. Harris, Warren, Gillibrand and Booker have signed on to the Debt-Free College Act, which would cost at least $840 billion over 10 years. Sanders has introduced a $2.2 trillion College for All Act that would make public colleges and universities tuition-free and debt-free, and erase the roughly $1.6 trillion in student loan debt. Warren has also proposed a $640 billion student loan debt cancellation plan.
Warren has proposed a plan for “universal child care” and early learning that would cost $700 billion over 10 years, while Harris, O’Rourke and Rep. Eric Swalwell (Calif.) have endorsed the Child Care for Working Families Act, which would cost $700 billion over 10 years. Sanders has also introduced a universal child-care bill but has not disclosed its costs.
Amazingly, none of the NBC anchors asked about the Green New Deal, but climate change was front and center in both debates. Joe Biden’s climate plan would cost $1.7 trillion over a decade. Warren has pitched a $2 trillion plan, Beto O’Rourke’s proposal would cost $5 trillion, while Washington Gov. Jay Inslee’s green-jobs plan would cost $9 trillion.
Then there are government-guaranteed jobs. Harris, Warren and Gillibrand have all co-sponsored Booker’s Federal Jobs Guarantee Development Act, while Sanders has proposed an ambitious government jobs plan with guaranteed wages of $15 an hour, the same retirement and health benefits as federal workers, subsidized child care and 12 weeks of paid family leave. None have explained how much their plans would cost, but the liberal Center on Budget and Policy Priorities put the cost of even a less ambitious guaranteed-jobs plan — covering just 9.7 million workers — at $6.8 trillion over the next decade. Andrew Yang proposed a government-provided universal basic income that would give every American over the age of 18 a monthly check of $1,000. Independent estimates put the costs of such a plan at between $28 trillion and $40 trillion over 10 years.
And it goes on. Warren also has put forward a $500 billion plan to pay for affordable housing for lower-income families, while Harris has proposed federal spending of $315 billion over 10 years to raise teacher pay. Add it all up, and it’s enough to make a Soviet central planner blush.
But where things get really expensive is the nexus between the Democrats’ spending plans and their immigration policies. During the first debate, former housing and urban development secretary Julián Castro said he would decriminalize illegal border crossings. When the candidates in the second debate were asked how many supported his plan, nearly every candidate’s hand went up. (Sen. Michael F. Bennet of Colorado was the only one to abstain.) Every candidate raised a hand when asked if their government health plan would provide coverage for illegal immigrants.
The combination of decriminalizing illegal entry and offering those who enter illegally free health care would create a magnet for millions to enter our country — dramatically increasing the cost of every public health-care plan. And once here, these migrants would presumably also seek to take advantage of other free programs the Democrats are proposing, which means their costs would also skyrocket beyond these estimates.
Open borders and socialism are a path to national suicide. According to the Congressional Budget Office, under current law — without all the Democrats’ new entitlements — debt held by the public is already projected to increase from 78 percent of gross domestic product today to 144 percent by 2049. This level of debt is unsustainable and could lead to another financial crisis.
But no worries, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio assured us that “there’s plenty of money in this country. It’s just in the wrong hands. Democrats have to fix that.”
I’m sure they will.
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