Bush won re-election to the House unopposed, while Nixon defeated Hubert Humphrey in the presidential election. In 1970, with President Nixon's support, Bush gave up his seat in the House to run for the Senate against Yarborough. Bush easily won the Republican primary, but Yarborough was defeated by the more centrist Lloyd Bentsen in the Democratic primary. Ultimately, Bentsen defeated Bush, taking 53.5 percent of the vote. However, both sides knew that spending cuts or new taxes would be necessary in the following year's budget in order to avoid the draconian automatic domestic spending cuts required by the Gramm–Rudman–Hollings Balanced Budget Act of 1987. Bush and other leaders also wanted to cut deficits because Federal Reserve Chair Alan Greenspan refused to lower interest rates, and thus stimulate economic growth, unless the federal budget deficit was reduced. In a statement released in late June 1990, Bush said that he would be open to a deficit reduction program which included spending cuts, incentives for economic growth, budget process reform, as well as tax increases.
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