Senate Democrat Calls For Clean Slate In Budget Talks

by Anna Cameron

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) urged Congress Wednesday to “hit the reset button” on the budget debate, just 9 days before the continuing resolution extension expires on March 18.

“It isn’t often that two failed votes in the Senate could be called a breakthrough, but the current debate over the federal budget has hit such an impasse that this will actually be considered progress,” said Schumer. “To make progress this time,…we must approach the issue from a different angle.”

Identifying the projected failure of votes on both H.R.1 and the Senate alternative as “an opportunity,” Schumer encouraged both parties to revisit the lessons of the Bush and Clinton administrations of the ’90s when formulating a new budget proposal.

In 1990, for instance, George H.W. Bush implemented a budget plan that saved approximately $500 billion. The initiative contained one third discretionary cuts, one third mandatory cuts, and one third tax increases.

“Like President George H.W. Bush and President Clinton, we need to look at all parts of the budget,” Schumer said. “We need an ‘all of the above’ approach.”

Schumer slammed the GOP’s budget approach, noting that the proposed cuts in domestic discretionary spending contained in H.R.1 would reduce the deficit by a “meaningless” 0.3 percent, while eliminating jobs and slashing funding in education, infrastructure and innovation in technology.

“Republicans are using deficit talk as a Trojan horse for their real aim - which is cutting government - and in particular, cutting programs they don’t like,” Schumer asserted.

Up-or-down votes on H.R.1 and a Senate proposal are slated to occur on the Senate floor Wednesday.