Budget deficit topped $1 trillion in ’19 for the first time since ’12

WASHINGTON — The federal budget deficit surpassed $1 trillion in 2019, the Treasury Department reported Monday, as tax cuts and spending increases continued to force heavy government borrowing amid a record-long economic expansion.

The deficit grew by 17% from 2018 to 2019, the Treasury data shows. That was a slowdown from the 28% growth in 2018, the first year President Donald Trump’s signature tax cuts were in full effect.

It was the first calendar year since 2012 that the deficit topped $1 trillion. Deficits swelled after the 2008 financial crisis, as lawmakers cut taxes and increased spending in an effort to revive growth. The gap had narrowed through 2015 under a budget agreement between President Barack Obama and Republicans in Congress, which reined in federal spending.

In Washington: The U.S. Supreme Court is leaving in place the public nudity convictions of three women who removed their bathing suit tops on a New Hampshire beach as part of a global campaign advocating for the rights of women to go topless.

The justices declined Monday to review a state court decision that found no violation of the women’s constitutional rights.

Heidi Lilley, Kia Sinclair and Ginger Pierro are part of the Free the Nipple campaign, a global effort advocating for the rights of women to go topless. They were arrested in 2016 after removing their tops at a beach in Laconia and refusing to put them on when beachgoers complained. Pierro was doing yoga, while the two others were sunbathing.