Huge Cuts in Safety Net Programs Averted: More Calls Needed This Week

Advocates for human needs were victorious in Congress last week. Lacking the votes to pass the budget reconciliation bill that would have saved more than $50 billion over five years by cutting programs serving low-income people, House leaders pulled the bill from consideration. Programs that would have been cut include Medicaid, food stamps, child support enforcement, foster care, student aid, and Supplemental Security Income.

The Washington , D.C. , offices of moderate Republican members of Congress were barraged with calls from human rights advocates urging them to reject the policy of cutting programs for low-income people to finance tax cuts for the wealthy.

Another major call-in effort may be necessary this week as the House leadership plans to bring budget reconciliation back to the floor as soon as Wednesday, November 16. They hope to obtain passage by the end of the week before Congress goes on a two-week recess. If this effort fails, budget reconciliation is dead for the year and the cuts will not happen.

Advocates urge the public to keep those calls going, especially to the three moderate Illinois Republicans who are swing votes on budget reconciliation: Reps. Tim Johnson, Judy Biggert, and Mark Kirk. Call the toll-free number 800.426.8073 to be connected to the Capitol switchboard and to any member of Congress.

The House leadership failed to muster the votes needed to pass budget reconciliation despite making last-minute concessions to moderate Republicans on drilling for oil in the Alaskan national reserve (Arctic National Wildlife Refuge) and very slightly softening and postponing the full impact of a proposal to cut food stamps for legal immigrants.

House leaders will continue to make concessions to the moderates, but the leadership can go only so far without losing support from the other side. Pressured across the country by advocates for human needs, Republican moderates are stiffening in their resolve that the American people do not support cutting programs for low-income people to finance tax cuts for the wealthy.

The Bush agenda of tax cuts for the wealthy and spending cuts in programs for low-income people also suffered a major setback in the U.S. Senate on the same day last week. Sen. Olympia Snowe, a Republican moderate from Maine , refused to support a tax reconciliation bill extending Bush’s 2003 cut in the tax rates on capital gains and corporate dividends. She said that she could not support a tax cut that primarily benefited the rich at the same time that Congress was trying to cut programs for the poor. Consideration of the tax measure by the Senate Finance Committee was cancelled because, without Senator Snowe’s support, the bill could not be passed. The Senate had earlier approved a budget reconciliation measure with spending cuts of $35 billion that, unlike the House budget reconciliation bill, was not targeted on low-income program beneficiaries.

For more information, contact Dan Lesser of the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law. Call the toll-free number 800.426.8073 to be connected to the Capitol switchboard and to any member of Congress.