Democrats are gearing up for a showdown with Republicans over their "devastating" spending cuts in a budget that could push Washington lawmakers to the brink of another government shutdown.
According to The Hill, Senate and House Republicans released a joint 2016 budget proposal that lays out the party's legislative program, which includes slashing domestic programs and repealing Obamacare, as well as several other cutbacks demanded by their conservative base.
But the GOP budget blueprint has already run into trouble, with Republican Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee putting the package briefly on hold, believing that it does not make steep enough cuts. The House then
canceled a vote Wednesday evening on a spending bill linked to the budget.
The White House has threatened to veto the first two Republican spending bills due to what it calls excessive cuts, while House Democrats are prepared to go to battle to support the vetoes.
After the GOP had vowed to run government efficiently ahead of the 2016 elections, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Speaker John Boehner assured voters that during the current cycle there would be no debt defaults or government shutdowns, such as the one that hurt the GOP politically in 2013, The Hill said.
But a shutdown is possibly in the cards later this year as a string of leading Democrats slammed the Republican spending cuts, claiming the GOP is kowtowing to major corporations at the expense of hard-working, middle-class Americans.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California called the GOP budget package a "bad deal" that would "ransack America's future," according to the political news website.
New York Sen. Charles Schumer attacked Republicans for "living in an ideological house of mirrors that does not reflect any reality."
And potential presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent and ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, blasted the plan as "a national embarrassment."
"At a time of massive wealth and income inequality," said Sanders, "this budget gives huge tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires, while making devastating cuts to education, Medicare, affordable housing, prescription drug coverage and many other vital investments for the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor."
House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland alleged that even some top Republicans believe that these spending cuts are impractical. And Schumer, the third-ranking Democrat in the Senate, agreed with him, saying that many Republicans would not approve such reductions, The Hill reported.
"If you asked the average Republican Party member to actually approve this budget, they'd be aghast," Schumer said. "This is to appease a narrow few who seem to be running the show."
House Budget Committee Chairman Tom Price of Georgia and Senate Budget Chairman Mike Enzi of Wyoming released the budget blueprint on Wednesday, The Hill reported.
The package is set to wipe out the spending deficits in the next 10 years with $5 trillion in spending cuts, $430 billion in Medicare reductions and procedural language designed to repeal Obamacare.
"Now that the Senate is under new management, we are getting back to work rebuilding the trust of hard-working Americans and doing the people's business," Enzi said in a statement.
"This will help change the way we do business here in Washington to make the government live within its means — just like hard-working families."
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