The House Budget Committee marked up the Fiscal Year 2007 budget resolution. Members offered amendments, debated spending provisions, and voted on several contentious provisions.
The legislation included an $873 billion cap on agency budgets renewed by Congress each year, assumed $50 billion for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and endorsed a 7 percent increase in next year’s core defense budget, which did not cover the costs of the war in Iraq. It also blocked attempts by Democrats to increase funding for port security, education, health programs, food stamps and homeland security. Democrats denounced the Republican blueprint, which would produce a deficit of $348 billion in 2007 and deficits totaling more than $1 trillion through 2011.