This piece was originally published in The Hill.
As the federal government once again approaches its debt limit, House Republicans are right to be pushing spending cuts to begin addressing the nation’s ballooning debt. The Congressional Budget Office predicts that the federal government will spend $663 billion on interest payments this year, an amount projected to climb to $1.4 trillion by 2033. That’s nearly $2 billion dollars per day spent on debt payments this year.
Last week, lawmakers took the first step toward passing a funding bill for the legislative branch that would provide nearly $7 billion in funding for Congress, the Capitol Police, and congressional support agencies — a 2.2 percent reduction from the current fiscal year’s levels. This modest reduction is consistent with House Republicans’ broad goal of cutting federal spending to begin to address runaway spending and debt.
But compared to the House majority’s legislation to raise the debt ceiling, Republican appropriators have spared the legislative branch from much deeper cuts planned for other programs. The Limit, Save, Grow Act of 2023, which passed the House last month, would return discretionary spending to FY2022 levels and cap future spending increases to 1 percent annually over the next 10 years. Lowering discretionary spending to FY2022 levels will require trimming 8 percent from current spending.
Some may wonder why lawmakers aren’t tightening Congress’s budget as much as they plan to cut other federal spending programs. But deeper cuts to the legislative branch would be penny-wise and pound-foolish and limit Congress’s ability to achieve larger fiscal savings.
