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.
In particular, the Government Accountability Office (GAO), which serves as Congress’s nonpartisan watchdog, is slated to receive $806 million, or nearly a 2 percent funding increase, in the House Republicans’ proposed appropriations bill for the legislative branch. That’s a $16 million increase but more than $50 million less than what the comptroller general requested for the oversight agency.
But GAO is a unique example where Congress spending more will actually deliver substantial taxpayer savings. The nonpartisan watchdog agency conducts oversight on behalf of Congress and annually issues more than 600 reports identifying ways to make the federal government work more efficiently. This work resulted in $56 billion in savings last year. Over the past five years, GAO’s estimated average return on investment has been more than $100 in savings for each tax dollar spent on its budget.
Taxpayers could save substantially more if Congress and federal agencies were quicker to act on GAO’s nonpartisan recommendations. Today, GAO reports that more than 4,800 of its recommendations have yet to be implemented. Next month, the comptroller general is scheduled to inform Congress how much the government could save if these changes were made, answering a bipartisan law included in the recent National Defense Authorization Act and report language accompanying the Omnibus spending bill that passed in December. Comptroller General Gene Dodaro has testified that an “additional tens of billions of dollars could be achieved if agencies and Congress addressed more of our recommendations.”
With this new roadmap to achieve government savings, Congress will have an opportunity to use its oversight and legislative powers to require federal agencies to trim wasteful spending. But this work will mostly fall to congressional committees, which require staff to advise and assist members in conducting their business. The House Republicans proposed funding bill for Congress wisely includes a 3 percent funding increase for House committee staff.
For fiscal conservatives frustrated by runaway federal spending, the growing regulatory state, and the government’s waste and inefficiency, adequately funding watchdogs and committee staff is a necessary step to reversing these troubling trends of American governance.
The funding outlook for these vital elements of the legislative branch remains unclear as the White House and House Republicans negotiate a debt ceiling deal. The House Appropriations Committee is set to vote on the Republicans’ proposed legislative branch funding bill on Tuesday. But for now, fiscal conservatives should be grateful that congressional Republicans recognize that spending more on government oversight will be a big win for taxpayers.
Dan Lips is head of policy at the Foundation for American Innovation.