It’s the tale of two budgets.
The Senate passed a draft spending plan yesterday that would slightly reduce the US debt load by taxing the wealthy — a plan that differed radically from the Republican-controlled House’s budget, which would repeal ObamaCare and dramatically cut programs such as health care and community development.
The House budget would keep taxes level and projects that the federal deficit would be reduced to $1.4 trillion by 2023. The Senate’s plan, which includes provisions to cut defense spending and farm subsidies, projects the deficit would be $5.4 trillion in 10 years.
The Senate decision to move its budget forward — made yesterday at 4:56 a.m. after a round of marathon voting — is the first spending plan the Democratic-controlled body has passed in four years.
But its passage doesn’t guarantee it will be enacted. Plans from the two legislative chambers still have to be reconciled in negotiations with the White House next month.
And Republicans are betting that ultimately a deal will not be hammered out.
“The only good news is that the fiscal path the Democrats laid out . . . won’t become law,” said Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell.
Even some Senate Democrats are pulling against their colleagues’ proposal. Four Democratic senators voted against the final version: Max Baucus of Montana, Mark Begich of Alaska, Kay Hagan of North Carolina and Mark Pryor of Arkansas. All face re-election battles in 2014.
“Honest people can disagree on policy, but there really cannot be disagreement on the need to change our nation’s budget course,” said Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama, the top Republican on the chamber’s Budget Committee.
The White House and other Senate Democrats were more positive about the impending budget showdown.
“Doing this has been a Herculean feat,” said Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid.
The Senate budget debate also included votes on issues that have been sticking points for Republicans and Democrats for months.
Seventeen Democrats joined Republicans in endorsing the construction of the Keystone oil pipeline, which Obama has opposed.
Such votes are mostly symbolic because they’re amendments to the budget, which isn’t a bill and can’t be signed into law. But they could offer a glimpse into things to come — in terms of both policy and the mid-term elections.
During the back-and-forth, Democrats forced Republicans to say whether they support the fiscal plans of House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin — five did not. And Republicans put almost every Democrat on the record in opposition to repealing the estate tax.