Sessions, Snowe target budget ‘tricks’ in new bill

The Alabama Republican also expressed hope that Democrats would join with him and Snowe on the bill, saying colleagues on the other side of the aisle have also called to reform the budget process.

“I find it more clearly advocated by new members on both sides,” Sessions said. “They know the American people are not happy.”

The Sessions-Snowe measure would make it harder to count reduced “budget authority” unless real cash savings materialize. For instance, the 2011 spending deal included $7 billion in reduced budget authority, but actually resulted in increased outlays.

{mosads}The measure would also prevent Congress from counting reduced mandatory spending for future years as savings in the current year, another tactic used in that 2011 deal. It also deepens the federal pay freeze, by eliminating automatic piecemeal pay freezes and counting bailouts of the Highway Trust Fund as new spending.

As for the budget process, the bill would require supermajority votes in the Senate to pass an appropriations bill without a budget resolution in place, and would also make it harder to make “emergency” supplemental spending that exceeds the budget.

In his conference call with reporters, Sessions predicted that much of his proposal could pass through the regular legislative process. But the senator also said he would not be surprised if the deficit-reducing supercommittee, which now has seven weeks to unveil its recommendations, took a look at budget reform. 

“I would expect that the committee of 12 may well propose some reforms that could help contain some spending, and these could be some of the things they could certainly look at,” Sessions said.

“We’ve got people in Congress still in denial,” Sessions added, referring to the U.S. fiscal situation. “I think America is on the path to a weaker nation if we don’t fix this problem soon.”

This post was updated at 11:50 a.m.