Written by by Katy Grimes at californiaglobe.com
Where did $30 billion of California’s budget deficit go?
California Governor Gavin Newsom put on quite a budget show this morning, feigning indignation over the Legislative Analyst’s Office’s recent update on the state’s actual budget deficit, which the LAO put at $68 billion. Newsom’s $330 billion budget has been whittled down to a svelte $291.5 billion.
“This is a story of correction and normalcy,” Gov. Newsom said, downplaying the swing from the $100 billion surplus to a $68 billion deficit.
“During the last few surpluses, a lot of money went to new programs rather than to the state reserve, and now look where we are. Now we have to make cuts to things that we shouldn’t have made in the first place,” Lee Greenman, a California-based accountant who helps city and other regional entities fix budget problems, told the Globe.
“The Governor is minimizing the true size of California’s budget deficit,” Assemblyman Josh Hoover (R-Folsom) said. “Meanwhile, the Legislature is debating a new ‘wealth tax’ to solve a budgetary problem they created with years of waste and overspending. No matter how high taxes get, it never seems to be enough. Raising taxes again will only increase costs on hardworking Californians and continue to drive taxpayers out of our state.”
Gov. Newsom denies a wealth tax and took a few pot shots at the Wall Street Journal editorial board for the (actual) proposed wealth tax on California’s highest earners and the wealthy:
“Progressive ideas that originate in California have a habit of spreading. So it’s worth paying attention to legislation moving in Sacramento to establish a wealth tax on high earners and a bounty-hunter scheme for plaintiff attorneys to target alleged tax dodgers.”
“The damage you intentionally do – there I said that,” the Governor said Wednesday, addressing their WSJ editorial board. ”
“I love this damn state,” he said dramatizing his indignation at the negative reporting over his leadership and ruinous economic policies.