At the Republican debate last night in South Carolina, Republicans were happy to talk about, and denounce, the budget deficit and debt. Senator Marco Rubio said that we must “bring our debt under control.”

Mr. Rubio, like other G.O.P. candidates, rails against the deficit as a sign of President Obama’s moral failure. He advocates a balanced-budget amendment.

As a recovering Republican who retired in 2011 after serving on the House and Senate Budget Committees, I have concluded that this ritual denunciation of deficits and out-of-control spending is a fraud. Not only does the party not care about the deficit, but its practice since 1981 has been to worsen it.

We should pay particularly close attention to the Republican budget proposals from the presidential candidates in 2016. If a Republican is elected president, the party will almost surely have maintained control of Congress and, therefore, control the federal budget.