05.23.11

Sessions Concerned By White House Meeting, Stalled Budget From Senate Democrats

WASHINGTON—U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), Ranking Member of the Senate Budget Committee, released the following statement today after the White House scheduled two summit meetings on the budget this week, a decision that would appear to necessitate the cancellation of this week’s much-anticipated mark- up of a Senate Democrat budget, most recently expected to begin on Wednesday:

“The announcement of these summit meetings at the White House is a stunning development. It has been 740 days since the Democrat Senate has passed a budget. This week Senate Democrats were finally going to unveil their plan for saving this nation from fiscal disaster and present that plan in the Senate Budget Committee. The plan has been a closely guarded secret, and Republican requests to make it public and to share it with members before they meet to work on it have been rebuffed. And now, by calling for this summit, it would seem the president has effectively cancelled this week’s planned unveiling of the Democrat budget.

The White House seems determined to avoid putting a real, honest plan on paper. All we have from the White House is a budget that, as estimated by CBO, would make our deficits dramatically worse, along with a speech framework that would do the same. In its rhetoric the White House calls for a responsible budget but refuses to present one. No amount of closed-door meetings, commissions, or summits will change the basic fact that in order to move forward the White House and the Democrat Senate must put forward an honest plan that ends the Washington spending spree instead of raising taxes to pay for it.”

[Note: To view a letter from all Budget Committee Republicans asking Chairman Conrad to schedule an open mark-up, please click here. To view the Budget Committee staff analysis of the president’s deficit reduction ‘framework,’ please click here. Finally, to view a letter from all Budget Committee Republicans asking President Obama to submit a detailed new budget plan after his speech provided few details, please click here.]