Pete Domenici: “I rise to address some concerns expressed by the administration with regard to two items they believe should be in this…”

“I rise to address some concerns expressed by the administration with regard to two items they believe should be in this reconciliation bill. I would like to clarify what we assumed in the 1998 budget resolution for those items. The bipartisan budget agreement did include assumptions on additional funding for unemployment insurance benefits integrity and on extension of fees for SSI State supplemental benefit administration. In both instances, the budget resolution assumed that these proposals would be implemented by the Appropriations Committee, and therefore the authorizing committees were not instructed to achieve these savings in reconciliation. The budget resolution is the basis for scoring congressional action and cannot be changed in an ad hoc manner, that is, without passing another concurrent resolution to change it. I would ask the chairman of the Appropriations Committee if it is not also his understanding that these proposals are to be considered by his committee?”