Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) on Wednesday suggested that Social Security and Medicare should no longer be classified as federal entitlement programs and instead the funds should be approved by Congress on a yearly basis in an effort to curb debt.
The lawmaker made the comments during an Aug. 3 interview on “The Regular Joe Show,” a conservative radio program on WTAQ News Talk in Wisconsin.
Johnson noted that budgets for the Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs are approved as discretionary spending annually.
“Social Security and Medicare, if you qualify for the entitlement, you just get it no matter what the cost,” he said. “And our problem in this country is that more than 70 percent of our federal budget, of our federal spending, is all mandatory spending. … You don’t get in there and fix the programs going bankrupt. It’s just on automatic pilot.”…