Budget Baby Steps

For months, the talk in Republican circles on Capitol Hill has been about trillions of dollars in budget cuts. But when the opportunity arose for big cuts this week, Republicans joined with Democrats in the House to reject a big chunk of savings.

The first budget bill dealt with homeland defense, as it spent just over $40 billion, down a little over a billion from the current budget.

Just as in debate earlier this year on a bill to cut money from the budget, the House on Thursday easily defeated a plan to knock off 10% of the homeland defense budget with an across the board budget cut.

"Something's got to give here guys," said Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) in debate, as he urged his own party to tighten their budget belts even more.

"We are spending way more than we are taking in. Everyone in America knows we can't do that," Jordan added.

"The government can do more with less on all levels," argued Rep. Todd Rokita (R-IN), "and that includes the Department of Homeland Security."

But when it came time for the votes to be counted, the 10% across the board cut - which would have saved around $4 billion - didn't come close to prevailing, as the House voted 312-110 against the plan.

108 Republicans voted for the cut, while 127 voted against it, again showing that lots of people like to talk about cutting the budget, but it's not easy to come up with big cuts that everyone can agree on.

Of the 29 Republicans on the House Appropriations Committee, a half dozen GOP lawmakers broke with their leaders and voted for the across the board cut: Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA), Rep. Tom Graves (R-GA), Rep. Jeff Flake (R-AZ), Rep. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), Rep. Alan Nunnelee (R-MS) and Rep. Kevin Yoder (R-KS).

Two Democrats also voted for the deep cut in homeland security, Rep. Jay Inslee (D-WA) and Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-NC).

The $1.06 billion in savings on this bill is part of a GOP budget roadmap that would ring up $30 billion in budget cuts for next year.

The House will work on more budget bills later this month. Next week, lawmakers will be back home, as the House takes a week off, while the Senate returns to work.

As for that vote on the 10% across the board budget cut in the homeland defense bill, here is the vote breakdown so you can check how your lawmaker voted:

FINAL VOTE RESULTS FOR ROLL CALL 402 (Republicans in roman; Democrats in italic; Independents underlined)
      H R 2017      RECORDED VOTE      2-Jun-2011      6:03 PM
      AUTHOR(S):  Rokita of Indiana Amendment No. 1
      QUESTION:  On Agreeing to the Amendment