Posted on 04/03/2016 2:28:33 PM PDT by drewh
As president, Donald Trump would sell off $16 trillion worth of U.S. government assets in order to fulfill his pledge to eliminate the national debt in eight years, senior adviser with the campaign Barry Bennett said.
"The United States government owns more real estate than anybody else, more land than anybody else, more energy than anybody else," Bennett told Chris Jansing Sunday on MSNBC. "We can get rid of government buildings we're not using, we can extract the energy from government lands, we can do all kinds of things to extract value from the assets that we hold."
In a wide-ranging interview with The Washington Post, Trump said he would get rid of the $19 trillion national debt "over a period of eight years." The article noted that most economists would consider Trump's proposal impossible, as it could require slashing the annual federal budget by more than half.
However, when pressed on whether the United States could sell off $16 trillion worth of assets, Bennett responded affirmatively on Sunday.
"Oh, my goodness," he said. "Do you know how much land we have? You know how much oil is off shore? And in government lands? Easily."
The federal government's assets totaled $3.2 trillion as of September 2015, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office. However, that does not include include stewardship assets or natural resources.
(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...
This is the Same TRump that just a couple of weeks ago suggested the fed should not turn control of federal lands over to the state they are in because they might not do the right things with them?
Now he says sell it?
I’ve been saying we should do this for years, but nobody listened. :-)
Chicago has done something this absurd.
http://m.chicagoreader.com/chicago/mayor-emanuel-locks-in-parking-meter-deal/Content?oid=9931786
I love how you assume nothing can be done. If Congress has to approve, twist their arm. Obama has no problem getting his way.
The government has thought of it. It either doesn’t work very well, or it works so well that the US loses strategic commodities without review.
Example:
Hamilton Field. A premier Air Force Base which was to be shut down and disposed at public auction during the Vietnam War.
Every time it goes up for sale, a pecking order of other government agencies have an opportunity to take control of it to save the government money.
About every 4-7 years, it has bounced between the Air Force, Navy, Coast Guard, Marin County, City of Novato, back to the County, back to Novato, homeless shelter, enterprise zone, housing, even the lease to keep pumps running so the San Francisco Bay doesn’t reclaim it have expired and reissued by other agencies.
Let’s also look at all the Cement and Coal the Clintons sold out to the Chinese, forcing the US into a cement and concrete shortage.
IMHO, the root of the problem is regulations. Get rid over the overwhelming qty of them. We need to get back to a regulatory environment of 100 years ago.
This is getting ridiculous. Just a few hours ago I was reading that he was going to eliminate the debt with “great deals”.
Guess that didn’t go over too well.
Now we know what plan B is.
I am anxiously waiting for plan C.
I love Trump. This is genius!! I want to sell the postal system.
Sell the capitol building first! It’s just a cesspool of entitled deadbeats anyway.
#69 I thought the postal service was private. We just throw bundles of money at it every year?
Stupid, who said to China. It is jackasses like you that are unable to think. Nobody take your crap that seriously.
"The United States government owns more real estate than anybody else, more land than anybody else, more energy than anybody else," Bennett told Chris Jansing Sunday on MSNBC. ..."
I like Trump’s plan to sell federal land in principle.
But I must question if the feds bought the land that they own under the terms of either the Constitution’s Clause 17 of Section 8 of Article I, or the 5th Amendment’s eminent domain clause. If the feds didn’t purchase a given piece of land according to the terms of the Constitution then they stole it from the states imo. And if such is the case then Trump has to rethink his plan.
I’m not a Trump supporter, but I do like this plan a lot. I mean a whole lot. If Trump would just stick to policy and how to run and stop a runaway government, he would be golden. Why must he act like a child and hurt his cause, because that is all some people see and hear and it overshadows the good he can do.
I like it too. Love it, in fact.
We are SO in debt now that if rates rise just a little, we won’t even be able to pay the interest on the debt. Much less pay the debt down. This is terrifying (or should be to everyone, but the sheeple don’t even seem to care).
I didn’t think anything could save this country from the path we are on, since the accumulated debt is so huge. It just seemed impossible, even with prudent spending from now on.
But this changes the game.
Trump really thinks outside the box, different from any other candidate.
in fact, he’s the ONLY candidate to discuss the debt. Where are the other so-called conservatives on this issue? They seem happy to keep us sliding towards that fiscal cliff.
Whoever buys it will then have to pay property taxes.
What exactly do you own?
Your local post office? Do you have the title to it?
That's exactly what all the disciples of deceit in D.C. are saying. They have no desire to see their bloated, killing government kingdom downsized and made at least manageable.
He already said we’re going to quit giving free services to other countries ;)
i like your thinking— how about we sell california to Mexico in exchange for them paying for the wall— i guess the wall would have to be bigger though if we did that..
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