David Obey: “this is really an incredible process that we are going through here this morning. When the majority party took control…”

“this is really an incredible process that we are going through here this morning. When the majority party took control of the House, they said they would do things differently, and they sure have. If we take a look at what has happened, this House has, or is supposed to have, an orderly budget process. We are supposed to produce a budget resolution which defines priorities and defines overall spending patterns, and then and only then are committees supposed to bring up their legislation which fits within the budget resolution which has been passed. Instead, this House, this year, under this leadership has blown that process to smithereens. First it started with the highway bill, which before the budget resolution was even considered ran that horse out of the barn. That bill wound up spending about $25 billion more than the budget allowed it to spend. Then this House passed the Kasich budget, which indicated that they were going to make substantial reductions below the budget which we agreed to last year. This chart demonstrates the difference between the Kasich budget and the budget that had been agreed to on a bipartisan basis with the White House last year. Under that bipartisan agreement last year, we are already supposed to be cutting domestic discretionary spending $43 billion below current services. Under the Kasich plan which this House passed, which that side of the aisle passed, those cuts are increased to $64 billion by the fourth year.”