White House falsely touts Trump budget's 'deficit reduction' as deficits grow

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said on Feb. 13, 2018, that President Trump's budget 'reduced the deficit by $3 trillion,' and deputy press secretary Raj Shah claimed it contained over $3 trillion in deficit reduction. FactCheck.org found the budget's own totals showed deficits growing from $665 billion to $984 billion over several years, with nearly $7.1 trillion in cumulative deficits over 10 years, and outside experts projected larger shortfalls driven by Trump's tax cuts and the Bipartisan Budget Act. The claim was described as misleading, if not dishonest, because projected reductions depended on proposed spending cuts and optimistic growth assumptions. Trump himself amplified the claim on Twitter the same week, writing that 'the budget I submitted to Congress reduces the deficit by $3 trillion over 10 years' and calling it 'the biggest deficit reduction in history.'

“The budget I submitted to Congress reduces the deficit by $3 trillion over 10 years — the biggest deficit reduction in history.” — Trump tweeted this claim on February 14, 2018, echoing the same false assertion made by his press secretaries at the White House podium the previous day.