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Obama wants to freeze budgets of domestic agencies at 2010 levels for five years.
Obama
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s budget submission on Monday will take a surgical approach to a deficit problem that his Republican rivals say warrants a meat ax.
As Obama seeks $53 billion for high-speed rail over the next few years, House Republicans are trying to pull back $2.5 billion that’s already been promised. He’s seeking increases for his “Race to the Top” initiative that provides grants to better-performing schools; Republicans on Friday unveiled a 5 percent cut to schools serving the disadvantaged.
Monday’s release of next year’s budget plan will be likely ignored by resurgent Republicans intent on cutting $100 billion from the president’s old budget.
The GOP drive to slash 2011 spending and much of the savings sought by Obama involve just a small piece of the budget pie — the annual domestic agency budgets that make up just one-tenth of federal spending. Tea party-backed House Republicans are trying to slash tens of billions of dollars in such programs to return them to levels when Obama first took office.
Obama’s promise to freeze budgets of domestic agencies at 2010 levels for five years — an austere plan by itself — looks generous by comparison.
On Saturday, he promised the government will have to tighten its belt.
“This budget asks Washington to live within its means, while at the same time investing in our future,” the president said Saturday in his weekly radio and Internet address.