WASHINGTON, April 29 (UPI) -- The U.S. Congress Wednesday passed a $3.4 trillion budget resolution for fiscal year 2010, approving most of President Barack Obama's spending priorities.
The budget was sent to the president on his 100th day in office without any Republican support, The Washington Post reported.
The Senate voted 53 to 43 in favor of the package. The vote was 233-193 in the House of Representatives. Seventeen Democrats in the House and three in the Senate voted against the budget, as did Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, who said this week he would leave the Republican Party.
"Along with the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, this budget is a key part our response to this recession," House Majority Leader Steney Hoyer of Maryland said during floor debate. "We have the power to emerge from this recession a stronger nation, one with a future of clean energy and energy independence, a workforce ready to compete with the best in the world, and a reformed system of healthcare."
Republican lawmakers expressed displeasure with the budget's projected $1.2 trillion for next year. House Minority Leader John A. Boehner, R-Ohio, called it an "audacious move to a big socialist government" that piles "debt on the backs of our kids and our grandkids."
Hoyer said the resolution would cut the deficit from 10.5 percent of the gross national product in 2009 to 3 percent of the GDP in 2014.
"Those savings come from spending restraint and oversight that saves taxpayer money," Hoyer said. "Most importantly, the House is strongly committed to statutory PAYGO (pay-as-you-go)," which Obama asked Congress to develop. Under PAYGO, any new spending must be offset by reductions or added revenue.
Under the pay-as-you-go system, Hoyer said the House wouldn't consider any bills on middle-income tax cuts, estate tax, alternative minimum tax relief "unless they include statutory PAYGO, they are fully offset, or statutory PAYGO has already been enacted."
The measure passed two days after congressional Democrats reached an agreement reconciling earlier House and Senate versions of the budget package, CNN reported.
