Baucus provides 'supercommittee' update
WASHINGTON -- The joint deficit reduction congressional committee will hold one, maybe two, public meetings next week, and no decisions are being made behind closed doors, Sen. Max Baucus, a member of the committee, said Wednesday.
The Montana Democrat said the first meeting will be at 10 a.m. Wednesday and will cover discretionary spending, those parts of the federal budget that are not mandated, such as Medicare and Social Security.
The 12 members — three Democrats and three Republicans each from the House and Senate — who comprise the so-called "supercommittee" have spent their first weeks on the job building trust with each other and gathering information as they strive toward an "historic" solution, Baucus said.
"This is one of the most difficult undertakings I've ever experienced, but that's why I signed up for this job," Baucus said. "I'm doing all I possibly can to get to an agreement and I think that attitude is shared by everyone else. There's no question we're going to get an agreement."
A New York Times report on Tuesday that the committee has stalemated because the six Republicans refuse to budge on tax increases is false, Baucus said.
"This is a tough job. We are talking about lots of options — a lot of options including cutting spending and a lot of options about raising revenue. No decisions made. That article was not quite accurate because the revenue is very much alive," Baucus said.
The meetings have been closed thus far to prevent interest groups from influencing members, he said.
"We're really going to keep all of this to ourselves. Once a proposal gets up to the public domain interest groups will jump all over it -- it makes things difficult," Baucus said.
No votes or final decisions will be made behind closed doors, said Baucus, who promised to open up Congress when first elected to the U.S. House in 1974.
"There were decisions made by members of the House and Senate in that Congress that were made not in public and that's wrong. This is different. All votes and all decisions will be made in public," Baucus said. "Just like there's sometimes private conversations between members of Congress, what really counts is when you sit down and make real decisions, and those decisions are going to be made in public."
On Wednesday the supercommittee listened to advice and asked questions of the so-called "Gang of Six," a group of three Democratic and three GOP senators who attempted this summer to negotiate a deal to cut spending and raise the debt ceiling.
Details of the 2½-hour meeting were not disclosed. The meeting, which mostly consisted of members of the supercommittee asking for advice of the senators, was "very positive," Baucus said.
"This is so complicated, we're really looking for any advice we can get," Baucus said.
The information gathering has included some history lessons. The committee is considering what happened when President Franklin Roosevelt and the Congress focused too intently on the deficit and slipped the country back into a recession in the late 1930s, Baucus said.
"We have to be careful we don't cut too much too quickly that puts our country back into a near recession or actual recession," Baucus said.
Avoiding a repeat of 1937 would be aided by including in the final proposal a short-term, jobs-creating plan along with the mid-to-long-term budget deficit reduction effort, Baucus said.
"It would help if we had some kind of jobs provision that the committee recommends. Might be a highway bill, but some kind of provision so the people have hope that the U.S. government is listening to, and trying to help get real, meaningful jobs in the United States."
Many in Washington believe that the committee will miss its Nov. 23 deadline to come up a plan to reduce the deficit by $1.2 trillion over the next 10 years.
These sentiments are not shared by members of the committee, Baucus said.
"I give (reaching an agreement) an excellent chance excellent. This is a committee to get an agreement. I think there will be an agreement," Baucus said.
