House To Take Up Cut, Cap and Balance Bill Next Week

While the White House and congressional leaders take a break from debt limit negotiations, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), flanked by his number two, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), announced Friday that the the House will take up a Cut, Cap and Balance bill next week.

“We want to change the system here,” Cantor said. “We want to be able to go home to the people that elected us and show them that we’re not going to allow this kind of spending to continue. We don’t have the money; they don’t have the money.”

Cut, Cap and Balance legislation would effectively cut $111 billion from the FY2012 budget, excluding mandatory expenditures like Medicare, Social Security and veterans funding. The legislation would also place a cap on spending, ensuring that expenditures do not exceed 22.5 percent of GDP in 2012. This cap would gradually reduce spending each year for ten years until the cap locks at 19.9 percent of GDP.

The bill would require Congress to pass a Balanced Budget Amendment which would need to be ratified on the state level before the president’s $2.4 trillion debt increase is granted.

“Listen, the Cut, Cap and Balance plan as the House will vote on next week is a solid plan for moving forward,” Boehner said. “Let’s get through that vote and then we’ll make decisions about what will come after.”

The House is also expected to take up the Balanced Budget Amendment separately next week.