Sen. Ted Cruz: Biden's new budget reveals the 'socialists are in charge of the White House'

President Joe Biden released his budget request for fiscal 2024 on Thursday, prompting Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) to conclude that socialists, not the accident-prone octogenarian, are running the White House.

Cruz told Fox News' Sean Hannity, "The sad truth is the socialists are in charge of the White House. Joe Biden certainly isn't."

The people Biden has surrounded himself with "have a very simple approach to everything: They want to spend money they don’t have, [and] they want to raise taxes on you," added the senator.

"They've unleashed record inflation," continued Cruz. "This budget that Biden put out would create a $50 trillion national debt, and their view is they can just keep printing money and unleashing inflation and keep borrowing money from China. It’s wildly irresponsible."

As of March 10, the total federal debt was $31.459 trillion, which breaks down to over $94,000 per citizen.

Despite Biden's claims that his proposal was fiscally responsible, Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget advocacy group, said, "When it comes to fixing the debt, this is by no means an award-winning budget."

The $6.8 trillion proposal — which the White House claimed will ultimately reduce the deficit by $3 trillion over a 10-year period — was touted by Shalanda Young, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, as the "start of a healthy dialogue." However, it appears Biden is speaking a different language than many Americans.

Whereas fentanyl, the drug killing tens of thousands of Americans every year, was mentioned only twice in the 182-page budget, equity was invoked 63 times and queer was mentioned seven times, reported Fox News Digital.

The fight to curb the flow of fentanyl did not appear to benefit from an equitable distribution of the administration's care.

While Biden would pour more money into programs for foreign nationals in the U.S. illegally as well as other migrants, he proposed spending only $40 million to combat fentanyl trafficking.

Equity, which is to say equal outcomes, similarly did not hold when it came to balancing border security with benefits for foreign nationals. Biden's budget would allot $7.3 billion for refugees but fund only an additional 350 border patrol agents to tackle the unprecedented stream of criminal noncitizens crossing U.S. borders, reported the Daily Mail.

"You know what is not in this budget?" Cruz asked Hannity. "Funds to secure our southern border. They want to fund 87,000 IRS agents, but they don’t have funds for significant numbers of new border patrol agents. They don’t have funds for significant numbers of DEA agents to stop the fentanyl crisis that led to over 100,000 overdoses that happened last year on Biden’s watch."

"This is a tax and spend budget," continued the senator. "They’ve got $5.5 trillion in new taxes in this budget. That includes taxes directly on energy. So, remember all of the Democrats who said they wanted the gas prices low? They were lying."

The administration's "extreme and really dangerous" priorities revealed in the bill "tell you who they are," said Cruz, who noted that where the Democrat president is concerned, concerns over inflation, opioid deaths, and border security take a backseat to so-called environmental justice, transsexuals, and climate alarmism.

Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) appeared to agree with Cruz, stating that Biden's "budget makes his priorities clear. His administration is at war with the American people’s freedom and prosperity. ... We need to shrink Washington and grow America. His budget would do the opposite."

Cruz underscored that this "political document" had "zero-point-zero percent chance of being enacted into law.

Upon unveiling his plan on Thursday, Biden said, "I want to make it clear I'm ready to meet with the speaker anytime, tomorrow, if he has his budget. Lay it down, tell me what you want to do. I'll show you what I want to do, see what we can agree on."

Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said, "Biden's budget is a reckless proposal doubling down on the same Far Left spending policies that have led to record inflation and our current debt crisis."

House Republicans have in mind $150 billion in cuts to non-defense discretionary programs, such as foreign aid, and $25 billion from the Department of Education, reported Reuters. These cuts would reportedly save $1.5 trillion over the next decade.

Members of the House Freedom Caucus proposed Friday that Congress cap overall discretionary spending at fiscal 2022 levels for 10 years, allowing for 1 percent growth per year, reported the Hill.

Additionally, they called to end Biden's allegedly unconstitutional student loan forgiveness; rescind unspent COVID-19 and Inflation Reduction Act funds; loosen domestic energy production regulations; and trim additional statist spoils.

In the budget, the White House notes it also seeks: to restore the full Child Tax Credit; a billionaire minimum tax; increases to the corporate tax rate; and the provision of national paid leave. Some efforts appear to have also been made to satisfy bipartisan desires to better compete with China and flood Ukraine with additional support.