Senators sound alarm as national debt approaches $37 trillion milestone

The U.S. national debt is rapidly approaching $37 trillion with no signs of slowing down as President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” is projected to raise budget deficits by $2.4 trillion over a decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) dynamic analysis. 

Senators from both parties sounded the alarm on the staggering debt crisis in interviews with Fox News Digital on Capitol Hill. 

“I’m very, very deeply concerned about that,” Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., said. “I think that’s gonna be part of the next big crisis, where we are gonna have to confront our national debt because it wasn’t that long ago that a trillion was unthinkable, and now that there’s 40 trillion approaching in our debt, we really have to address it, honestly.”

Trump signed his “one big beautiful bill” by Congress’ self-imposed July 4 deadline. It includes the fulfillment of Trump’s key campaign promises through the reconciliation process, including tax cuts and reforms to immigration, energy and Medicaid.

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But conservative fiscal hawks, including Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., who voted no and regularly sports a national debt clock badge, threatened to derail its passage as they spoke out against its contribution to the national debt.

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Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala., a Trump ally and advocate for the bill, told Fox News Digital, “The time for tough conversations is now.”

She said the United States must continue to look for waste, fraud and abuse—a nod to former Trump-ally turned online foe, Elon Musk, who spearheaded efforts to cut government spending via the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) earlier this year, before a well-documented fallout between Trump. 

“When you think of things like Social Security and Medicare, people say that they could be insolvent within the next eight years,” arguing that interest on the U.S. debt and mandatory spending on programs, like Medicaid, are taking up a big portion of the pie. 

“We’ve got to make sure that we are more responsible with taxpayer dollars,” Britt added. 

Meanwhile, freshman Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, described the U.S. debt crisis as a “moral failing that we leave this country to our kids and grandkids with this kind of level of debt.” 

“$37 trillion of debt is unimaginable, right? We’ve got to balance our budget. We need to do it right now. If we don’t do it, what’s going to happen is interest [rates] are going to go up. Inflation is not going to be under control. It’s real simple,” Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., told Fox News Digital. 

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisc., agreed, “We need to focus on spending, spending, spending. I’ve been beating this drum really since I got here, but particularly with this administration, since January 1st, trying to return to a reasonable pre-pandemic level spending.”

While Republicans have led the charge on eliminating waste, fraud and abuse in government spending, Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., said the number one priority should be reversing “all these massive tax breaks of billionaires and millionaires in America.”

Trump’s megabill included an extension of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), as well as new tax breaks on tipped wages and overtime. 

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Markey added, “We can save trillions and trillions of dollars that are going to be wasted in our country by giving these massive taxpayers by the trillions to the wealthiest. We also have to re-examine our defense budget. We actually don’t need a whole new generation of nuclear weapons.”