Federal Deficit Skyrockets Under Bush Administration
During his first two and a half years in office, Bush has catapulted the nation from a $127 billion surplus to a projected deficit of $1.9 trillion by 2008. The 2003 budget deficit is set to hit a record high of $455 billion, a dramatic increase from the $158 billion deficit for the 2002 fiscal year, the Washington Post reports. Estimates for 2004 place the budget deficit even higher at $475 billion—a sum which does not include the rapidly accumulating costs of the U.S. military presence in Iraq, which the Defense Department is currently estimating at $5 billion per month. The Post reported that White House budget director Joshua B. Bolton attributes 23% of the nation's deficit to the three successive Bush tax cuts.
Sources: Washington Post, "White House Foresees 5-Year Debt Increase of $1.9 Trillion," Jonathan Weisman, July 16, 2003

Following "Official" End of the Recession, Bush Diverts Blame, Unemployment Continues to Rise
According to the New York Times, the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), an independent group that tracks the business cycle, recently concluded that the recession ended in Nov. 2001, eight months after it started in March and two months after tens of thousands lost jobs in the wake of terrorist attacks. A number of economists remain skeptical of the economy's potential for growth, particularly as millions of Americans remain jobless and more than one million private-sector jobs have been lost since the recession's alleged end. The Times reported that while the economy exhibited six consecutive months of job growth only 12 months after the official end of the recession in the early 1990's, payrolls are continuing to decline now 20 months after the reported end of the most recent recession. As Bush's 2004 re-election campaign begins to accelerate, the Washington Post reported that Bush has been practicing some of his own "revisionist history" in attempting to pin the blame for the recession on the Clinton administration. The Post reports that in Nov. 2001, Bush made several comments acknowledging the NBER-identified start of the recession in March 2001. Yet beginning in August 2002, and increasingly so in his re-election campaign, Bush began to insist that his administration "did, in fact, inherit an economic recession," which he stamped with a new start date of Jan. 1, 2001.
Sources: New York Times, "Recession is Over; Jobs Aren't Trickling Down," Daniel Altman, July 18, 2003

Bush Administration's Free Trade Policies Contribute to Record Deficit
During the first quarter of 2003, the U.S. reached a record trade deficit of $136.1 billion. The trade deficit—considered to be the best measure of the country's international economic standing as well as the investment flows between countries and unilateral transfers such as foreign aid payments—increased by 5.8 percent during the period of January through March. According to the Washington Post, critics of the Bush administration maintain that the "growing deficits are proof that the administration's free-trade policies are not working." The Post also reports that Bush's free trade policies—which contend that the best way to reduce the deficit is for other countries to remove trade barriers—are being blamed for the loss of millions of American manufacturing jobs.
Source: Associated Press, "Trade deficit swells to record $136.1 billion in first quarter," Jeannine Aversa, June 19, 2003

Unemployment Hits Nine-Year High, Democrats Fault Bush's Economic Policies
The Labor Department recently announced that the unemployment rate reached a nine-year high of 6.1% due to the loss of 17,000 jobs in May. In reaction to the news, several Democrats voiced concern that Bush's economic policies are to blame for the steady rise in unemployment rates since the beginning of his administration. According to the White House Bulletin, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi of California contends that Bush has established "the worst record of job-creation of any President since the Great Depression." She went on to comment that Bush's policies have resulted in a nearly $3 trillion increase in America's debt and the loss of more than three million jobs. The White House Bulletin also quoted House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland as saying that Bush's "only answer to this glaring problem is to cut taxes in a way that most economists agree won't stimulate the economy and that will impose a greater share of the tax burden on the middle class."
Source: AFL-CIO, "15 Million Unemployed and Underemployed as Jobless Rate Rises Again." No Author, June 9, 2003; The White House Bulletin, "Democrats, AFL-CIO Slam Bush on Unemployment; Chao Defends Administration's Record," No Author, June 6, 2003.