Republican Study Committee Releases Budget Proposal

Posted on January 21, 2011October 17, 2012

The Republican Study Committee (RSC), a group of 174 House Republicans “organized for the purpose of advancing a conservative social and economic agenda in the House of Representatives,” has released a proposal containing an estimated $2.5 trillion (over 10 years) of spending cuts. It is expected that the package will be debated and voted on in the House before the current continuing resolution expires on March 4th. Items of particular note in the proposal include elimination of the National Endowment for the Humanities and National Endowment for the Arts, as well as elimination of Recovery Act funding that has yet to be allocated and applied research within the Department of Energy.

The proposal is only one of many circulating on the Hill right now, but provides some insight into how a significant portion of the House wishes to proceed on the budget.

RSC summary and list of programs targeted for elimination

NSF Director Talks Budget

Posted on January 19, 2011October 17, 2012

Yesterday, during a session with the Coalition for National Science Funding (CNSF), NSF Director Subra Suresh fielded questions from academic research advocates. Dr. Suresh stated that the National Science Foundation is closely monitoring budget discussions on Capitol Hill in order to chart a course for both FY11 and FY12. He expressed familiarity with the calls of some on the Hill to roll back federal spending to FY08 levels, stating that such a move would have a devastating impact on the agency. However, he mentioned that at this point, the agency views a rollback to FY08 as highly speculative and as a result is not actively planning for such an outcome.

Dr.Suresh fielded several questions on the impact of the ongoing continuing resolution on the NSF. He revealed that the agency is allowed to spend up to 50% of its previous years allocation, so as of right now, decisions on grant applications are not widely being held for the FY11 appropriations process to conclude. He also made a case for resisting calls by some to eliminate the Social and Behavioral and Economic Sciences Directorate.

Beyond budget, Dr. Suresh talked about his desire to incorporate many of the educational elements of the Education and Human Resources Directorate into the other NSF directorates. He also articulated a vision for streamlining the hiring of senior NSF officials and promoting diversity both within the agency and more broadly among the scientific community.

CNSF is an alliance of over 125 organizations (including the University of Washington) drawn together by a concern for the future vitality of the national science, mathematics, and engineering enterprise.

Federal Spending Cuts Planned

Posted on January 19, 2011October 17, 2012

House Republicans are still considering options for how best to keep their campaign promise to cut federal spending and the overall size of government. Today they will consider a resolution that would require the House Budget Committee Chairman to set FY11 non-security discretionary spending limits at FY08 levels. The full House expects to vote on the measure early next week. If approved, which is likely, the vote would put the chamber on record in support of cutting non-security discretionary spending before President Obama gives his State of the Union Address to Congress next Tuesday.

Once the House sets a new FY11 discretionary spending cap, House GOP appropriators will start assembling an extension of the stopgap resolution that is now funding the government, including cuts to non-security domestic spending. The current CR, which runs through March 4th, generally continues funding at FY10 levels. Since the Senate’s Democratic majority is unlikely to go along with the House proposals, the two chambers and the President will eventually need to strike an agreement on funding the government for the remainder of the year.

The House Republican leadership also needs to turn their attention to the upcoming vote to raise the nation’s debt ceiling and development of an FY12 budget resolution. While lowering non-security discretionary spending to FY08 levels would be a major victory for Republicans, it is clear that they intend to push for even deeper cuts for FY12. The House Majority Leader has stated that Republicans won’t agree to increase the nation’s debt ceiling without strong assurances of cuts in federal spending. The House Republicans will almost certainly use the debt ceiling vote as a bargaining chip to lock in an agreement with Democrats and the President on spending cuts for FY12 and beyond.

Meanwhile, the House unanimously passed the second of its weekly GOP bills to cut spending yesterday. The amended bill (HR 292) eliminates the requirement that the Government Printing Office (GPO) print hard copies of introduced legislation for use by members of the House and Senate. Instead, they would only be published in electronic form, saving a significant portion of the $7 million the GPO is expected to spend on congressional printing this year.

Tucson Tragedy Puts Legislative Schedule on Hold

Posted on January 10, 2011October 17, 2012

The shooting over the weekend of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and 19 others has prompted House leaders to cancel pending action on legislation this week, including their plans to vote on repealing health care reform. Instead, the House will be in session for two days this week but the only business will occur Wednesday when the chamber will consider resolutions honoring the victims of the shooting in Tucson. No recorded votes are expected this week.

Also postponed is the second of the House Republican’s promised weekly votes to cut federal spending. The measure they intended to bring up this week calls for the elimination of a requirement that the Government Printing Office (GPO) print hard copies of all bills and resolutions introduced in Congress, thus saving on printing costs and requiring users to view documents on-line.

The short work week will culminate with an already planned House Republican annual issues retreat on Thursday and Friday. At their retreat, Republicans will be discussing how they plan to achieve their many goals in this Congress, including cutting federal spending and overturning or slowing Obama’s health care reforms. The Senate, meanwhile, last week began a two-week recess and won’t return until the week of January 24^th.

Fiscal Issues Dominate First Days in Congress

Posted on January 7, 2011October 17, 2012

The 112th Congress convened Wednesday amid ceremonial pomp in the House with the election of Speaker John Boehner (R-OH). Their first order of business was to adopt a rules package for the 112th Congress that is designed to advance Republican priorities to control federal spending, cut the deficit, and makes the chamber more accountable to the public.

On Thursday, the House adopted a resolution that would make 5 percent reductions the next two years to the budgets for House offices, including those of members, leaders, and committees. Republicans estimate that the cuts will save more than $35 million in the first year alone and see the measure as the first of many steps to fulfill their promise to cut federal spending. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) said that in addition to cutting current-year spending, further cuts to discretionary spending would be made for FY12. The plan in coming months is to cut FY11 non-security funding down to 2008 levels, which would now amount to a cut of about $60 billion given that domestic agencies will have been funded at 2010 levels for five months of the fiscal year by the time the existing CR expires March 4th.

Also on Thursday, US Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner called on Congress to raise the existing $14.29 trillion debt limit soon, as he estimates the current ceiling will be reached sometime between March 31 and May 16 and that the government now is only $335 billion away from that limit. Raising the debt limit simply allows the government to fund obligations established by both Republican and Democratic Congresses and wouldn’t alter or increase the nation’s obligations. Geithner also emphasized that a default is very different from a temporary shutdown of the government caused by the failure to enact appropriations bills, such as occurred in late 1995 and early 1996. Even if Congress were to immediately cut spending to 2008 levels as suggested by Republicans, it would only delay the need to increase the debt limit by no more than two weeks. Republicans in both chambers say they will agree to raise the debt limit only if the White House agrees to major cuts in federal spending. Although some rank-and-file Republicans have said they won’t agree to any increase and see it as a way of prompting a government shutdown, GOP leaders have maintained that an increase will have to occur and have eschewed any talk of government shutdowns.

Several measures were introduced in the House yesterday that would reduce federal agency budgets by 5, 10, or 15 percent. These measures will likely act as legislative vehicles for the ongoing debate about how to reduce federal spending and likely will come into play as Congress addresses the issues of increasing the debt limit. The Republican leadership in the House will certainly use these or similar measures as bargaining chips with the White House to force spending cuts in exchange for their support on raising the debt limit.

The House and Senate calendars diverge over the next few weeks. The House starts with general organizing committee meetings over the next two weeks and has scheduled a break for the week of January 31^st. The Senate, though technically in session, does not return for regular business until January 24^th and does not have another scheduled break until the Presidents Day recess starting February 21^st.