Crucial moments from budget conference Day 1

The opening session of the House-Senate budget conference featured two and a half hours of opening speeches. In most of them, members restated Democratic and Republican talking points while striving to sound reasonable and open to compromise.

Some members appeared to signal more openness to compromise than others, while everyone appeared resigned to forgetting about a deficit grand bargain.

Staff and leaders will talk over the coming weeks before the next Nov. 13 meeting of the group and it is unclear if that meeting will feature a hearing or actual give-and-take negotiating.

Here are some highlights of Day 1:

LEADERS

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) ruled out a grand bargain and any deal that raises taxes, but said he sees “signs of common ground.” He said the conference could encourage tax reform taking place outside the committee. “If this conference becomes an argument about taxes, we’re not going to get anywhere,” Ryan said.

Senate Budget Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray (D-Wash.) drew her redlines — no cuts to entitlements without special protections for seniors and families, and closing tax breaks has to be part of the agreement. She said “compromise runs both ways. While we scour programs to find responsible savings, Republicans are also going to have to work with us to scour the bloated tax code.” 

House Budget Ranking Member Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) urged his colleagues to keep all options on the table including taxes. “We should not start the negotiation by taking things off the table,” he said. Van Hollen suggested that passing an immigration bill would decrease the long-term deficit and that encouraging passage of the bill could be part of the budget conference’s objectives. 

Senate Budget Committee Ranking Member Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) urged the conference to keep the sequester-level spending now in law and said the group should not ignore ObamaCare, the issue that led to a 16-day government shutdown this month. “Tax, spend, regulate, and debt will never work. It’s a plan guaranteed to fail,” he said. Sessions was the only member to really highlight ObamaCare.

HOUSE GOP

Conservative Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.) ruled out higher taxes but said a path to a deal can be found by focusing on waste, fraud and abuse. “Imagine those kinds of savings that get away from the we win/you lose mentality so prevalent here in Washington,” Price said.

 Rep. Diane Black (R-Tenn.) said her class of 2011 in the House was elected to cut spending but that some compromise can be found. 

Appropriator Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said the revenue should be part of the deal but the issue can be resolved by focusing on areas which bring money to the government without raising taxes. He mentioned encouraging repatriation of foreign profits and the sale of federal assets “More revenue shouldn’t mean higher taxes,” Cole said. “Sadly compromise has become a dirty word in Washington,” he added. 

HOUSE DEMOCRATS

Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) focused his time on the role high unemployment plays in increasing the deficit and called for jobs measures, including increases in infrastructure spending.

Rep. Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.), ranking member of the Appropriations Committee, used her time to focus on the consequences of the automatic sequestration budget cuts that went into effect in March. Lowey argued that the $967 billion spending level in the Ryan budget is a phony number since the House GOP was never able to pass an appropriations bill instantiating the cuts. “The Republican majority could not pass any spending bills at the sequester level,” she noted. 

SENATE DEMOCRATS AND INDEPENDENTS

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said that the revenue impasse can be solved by going after some tax gimmicks in the budget conference and encouraging “pro-growth” tax reform through the Ways and Means and Finance Committees. “We can close loopholes without jeopardizing the goal of comprehensive tax reform,” he said.

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) said ending “offshore tax havens” would completely pay for replacing the annual budget sequester.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) said going after “big oil” tax breaks should be part of the deal and said there is room for compromise on healthcare savings.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said the conference should listen to opinion polls that show little support for cutting entitlements and large support for taxing the rich.

Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) emphasized that the differences on the 2014 appropriations number is bridgeable.

Sen. Angus King (I-Maine.) emphasized that the deal should encourage economic growth while repairing infrastructure. 

SENATE GOP

Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) struck more of a hard-line tone saying he is skeptical of replacing the sequester with future entitlement cuts and that the Pentagon should not be a sacred cow. He said updating the Pentagon’s accounting practices should be a priority. “The offer of a balanced plan is wrong-headed,” he said of any attempt to raise taxes. Grassley blasted leaders for making past budget deals behind closed doors and forcing rank-and-file to accept a finished product. He called for all budget talks to be open to the public.

Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.) pushed his “penny plan” to cut 1 percent from overall spending per year for two years. The plan, which has little chance of approval, would balance the budget at that time and cap spending as a percentage of gross domestic product. Enzi pushed a less radical plan to switch to a two-year budgeting cycle.

Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), who had served on the Bowles-Simpson Commission and Gang of Six, threw in the towel on the grand bargain but said that doing more to enforce budget controls could be an outcome of the conference. “I know we don’t have time to put together kind of large deal … that all of us know needs to get done,” he said. 

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said compromise is possible and that defense cuts are gutting the military. Although both parties talk like “we are different political planets here”  he said “there’s reasonable entitlement reforms that could replace defense and non-defense sequestration.” Graham also called for an immigration reform bill. 

Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), a former Gang of Six member, lamented that the conference will not be able to do a grand bargain, but said dealing with the sequester and avoiding shutdowns should be the bare minimum the conference accomplishes. “Try to agree to do no harm,” he said. 

Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), who served on the failed supercommitee, said a “grand bargain will probably elude us.” He said the group must preserve the level of savings in the Budget Control Act, try to curb the size of government and adopt a proposal from Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) to avoid future shutdowns. The Portman plan would automatically extend government funding if there is a lapse in appropriations but cut spending by 1 percent automatically. Toomey also called for sequester flexibility. 

Portman said any deal needs to deal with entitlements, encourage tax reform and include a plan like his to avoid future shutdowns. 

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) devoted his time to statistics on the long-term funding problems of Medicare and Social Security and called on the conference to look at those.

Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) focused on the defense sequester’s effects and on supporting the Portman shutdown plan. She urged both sides to “get out of our trenches on both sides” and find a compromise. 

Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) said that while he doesn’t like the sequester he “can live with it.” He added that “I will support additional revenues … but they must come through economic growth” and that “I am equally sure Republicans in Congress will not support tax increases … either through the front door or the back door.” He urged the conference to pocket the cuts to Social Security and Medicare in President Obama’s own budget. “Those are the sweet spots,” he said.