Pat Toomey, the Republican Senate candidate from Pennsylvania, is proposing that programs funding student travel abroad be cut in an effort to keep President Bush’s tax cuts.

In a Sunday interview with Toomey, Fox News’ Chris Wallace observed that the candidate’s plan to extend all of the Bush tax cuts and cut the corporate tax rate would add trillions of dollars to the deficit.

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“The question becomes what are you going to cut?” asked Wallace.

“First of all, it’s not clear that that would add trillions to the deficit,” Toomey replied.

“The real problem is the spending side,” he noted. “I think we should look at consolidating all kinds of programs in the government.”

“You know, we found 75 different programs between the Department of Education and the Department of State that all subsidize one form or another of overseas student travel and student education. That’s the kind of waste and duplication that we can rein in.”

The candidate also favored abolishing earmarks and rescinding unspent portions of the stimulus bill.

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While Toomey says “it’s not clear” that tax cuts will add to the deficit, many economists disagree. The liberal Center for American Progress found that the Bush tax cuts actually cost about $2.5 trillion in the 10 years that they have been law.

Former director of the Congressional Budget Office Douglas Holtz-Eakin recently said there is “no serious research evidence” to prove that tax cuts pay for themselves.

Toomey is neck-and-neck with Democratic Senate nominee Joe Sestak, and leads Sestak in the most recently published poll, 47-42 percent.

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This video is from Fox’s Fox News Sunday, broadcast Oct. 24, 2010.



