Harry Reid to Introduce $2.7 Trillion All-Cuts Spending Plan – No Tax Hikes …Update: Obama Shoots Down Deal?
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is set to introduce a $2.7 trillion all-cuts spending plan today with no new tax hikes. The plan meets GOP requirements that the debt ceiling be increased with dollar for dollar spending cuts.
The Politico reported:
Democratic leaders said on Monday that they are looking toward Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s upcoming new proposal to raise the debt ceiling as offering “hope” for a deal – and warned time is fast running out.
“I think we’ve got 48 hours within which to do something very, very meaningful,” Assistant House Minority Leader James Clyburn (D-S.C.) said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”
The plan that leads to progress, he said, could be Reid’s Sunday proposal, which would cut at least $2.7 trillion in spending and be matched by an equal increase to the debt ceiling.
Citing Reid’s plan, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), the third-ranking Senate Democrat, said, “I think there’s some hope today” for progress.
“Sen. Reid is going to put forth an offer that meets the Democrats’ main criteria, going past 2012, and the two Republican criteria — enough cuts to equal the amount you raise the debt ceiling and no revenues,” Schumer said on MSNBC. “And I think that has some hope.”
Reid’s as-yet-to-be-unveiled plan, Schumer said, has the potential to be sufficiently conciliatory to House Speaker John Boehner’s (R-Ohio) caucus that an agreement can be reached. “Hopefully it’s the kind of thing that Speaker Boehner can rally his tea party troops toward,” he said.
It’s also the kind of proposal that can get enough Democratic support to pass both the House and the Senate, Schumer said.
Jennifer Rubin reported that President Obama just turned down the last minute deal.
A Republican aide e-mails me: “The Speaker, Sen. Reid and Sen. McConnell all agreed on the general framework of a two-part plan. A short-term increase (with cuts greater than the increase), combined with a committee to find long-term savings before the rest of the increase would be considered. Sen. Reid took the bipartisan plan to the White House and the President said no.”
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