evidence: President Joe Biden on Wednesday tried to cast his administration as spending hawks, touting sizable reductions in the federal deficit this fiscal year as a key departure from what he characterized as rampant spending by his Republican predecessor. [...] The president's more-modest budget proposal doesn't include a majority of the cost of Biden's massive Build Back Better agenda, a transportation and technology infrastructure program that Democrats haven't been able to pass. The administration priced the plan at $1.75 trillion, but it phased out some of the programs that would likely be permanent to reduce the price tag on paper. The Congressional Budget Office estimated its costs at around $4.73 trillion if the programs were permanent. [...] "We're on track to cut the federal deficit by another — another — $1.5 trillion by the end of this fiscal year, the biggest decline in a single year in American history," Biden said from the White House.