02.14.12

Sessions To WH Budget Chief: You Work For The American People, Not The Obama Campaign

“Given the gravity of our fiscal crisis—and Mr. Zeints’ obligation to present honest facts to the public—I asked him whether, if he was shown to be wrong, he would resign. I will soon be sending him a letter expressing my concerns from today’s hearing and pressing for a straightforward answer to a straightforward question.

Mr. Zeints must remember—he works for the American people, not the Obama campaign. And the American people have a right to know the truth.” 

WASHINGTON—U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), Ranking Member of the Senate Budget Committee, issued the following statement today after the Acting Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Jeffrey Zeints, testified before the Committee:

“Unveiling his budget plan yesterday, President Obama said: ‘I’m proposing some difficult cuts that, frankly, I wouldn’t normally make if they weren’t absolutely necessary. But they are. And the truth is we’re going to have to make some tough choices in order to put this country back on a more sustainable fiscal path.’

Americans hearing this would undoubtedly assume that the president is reducing spending below those levels currently set in place. Similar conclusions would be reached based on virtually every public description the White House team has offered of their budget plan.

At today’s hearing on the president’s budget, we saw that the emperor has no clothes. I asked Jeffrey Zients, the president’s acting budget director, a fundamental question: Does the president’s budget plan increase or decrease spending, relative to the debt-limit agreement we reached last year? Has the president proposed lowering the spending trajectory beyond what was enacted into law, or has he proposed increasing spending over what he and Congress agreed to? In other words, which direction is spending going from where we are right now?

But Mr. Zients repeatedly attempted to deflect the question. Finally, he replied that spending would go down under the president’s budget. But this is untrue. For instance, the president eliminates the current-law $1.2 trillion sequester, replacing it with a spending increase and tax increase. Overall, the Senate Budget Committee’s analysis demonstrates that the president’s budget plan would increase spending $1.5 trillion above current policy.

Given the gravity of our fiscal crisis—and Mr. Zients’ obligation to present honest facts to the public—I asked him whether, if he was shown to be wrong, he would resign. I will soon be sending him a letter expressing my concerns from today’s hearing and pressing for a straightforward answer to a straightforward question.

Mr. Zients must remember—he works for the American people, not the Obama campaign. And the American people have a right to know the truth.”