Political Quotes

“Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I rise today in support of my bill, the Increasing Baseline Updates Act. I thank the gentleman from New York (Mr. Suozzi) for co-leading this effort. The Increasing Baseline Updates Act would require CBO to produce at least two baseline updates per year, including at least one with economic data. Currently, under the Budget Act, CBO is required to publish its baseline before February 15 of each year, but a specific number of baseline updates is not statutorily required. As a result, in recent years, CBO has not published updates to the baseline later in the calendar year. The last time CBO published a baseline update after July was in 2020, and the Office has not published three baseline updates in a calendar year since 2019. By requiring these two additional baseline updates each year, the Increasing Baseline Updates Act will ensure Congress has updated information on the most relevant budget and economic figures to better inform the appropriations process and other legislative proposals we consider later in any given calendar year. The bill also ensures CBO will receive the relevant technical data from the executive branch by February 1 of each year so CBO can complete their baseline in a timely manner. I was proud that this bill unanimously passed the Budget Committee this past September, with the help of the ranking member from Pennsylvania.…”