GOP Rep. Adrian Smith: We’ll Have More Inflationary Pressure When Unspent COVID Relief Money Gets Spent

On Friday’s broadcast of the Fox Business Network’s “Mornings with Maria,” Rep. Adrian Smith (R-NE) stated that people should be worried about inflation remaining high because there are still large amounts of COVID relief money that have not been spent by local governments yet and when this money is spent, it will likely add to inflation.

Host Maria Bartiromo said, “We’ve been talking for many months on this program about the fact that all of the money from the COVID relief package has not been fully allocated just yet. Rep. Jason Smith (R-MO), the Ranking Member on the Budget Committee, came on the show and told me there are states that are still getting hundreds of millions of dollars, talk to us a little bit about that and why that is one of the pressures keeping inflation elevated.”

Smith responded, “Well, when you look at the restrictions, Chuck Schumer lead the way on telling local governments that they can’t use any of these payments to reduce taxes. And so, a lot of these dollars are parked. So, when you already see what’s been done and that it’s caused inflation with federal spending — taxpayer dollars — and the fact that there are still all these dollars parked at local governments around the country, that should make a lot of folks nervous.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett

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