Washington, D.C. – U.S. Representative Charles W. Boustany, Jr., (R-Southwest Louisiana), today voted against a House Democrat gimmick while urging House leaders to enact true pay-as-you-go legislation.

“Today’s bill fails to stop runaway federal spending, plain and simple,” Boustany said.  “Congress needs to rein in spending, and Democrats’ so-called “PAYGO” attempt ignores more than 40% of the federal budget.  Working together, we can reduce spending in a real way – preventing waste, fraud and abuse in the system.  Today’s vote is simply a cover vote ahead of next week’s vote on a massive health care overhaul that won’t lower costs for patients or taxpayers.”

Exemptions Under the Bill:  The bill has numerous exceptions to the PAYGO requirements that allow legislation with high mandatory costs to be enacted without offsets, in spite of the statutory PAYGO restrictions.
Discretionary Spending:  The bill exempts discretionary spending-approximately 40 percent of federal spending-from being subject to PAYGO budget neutrality requirements.

Exempt Programs:  Under the Budget Enforcement Act of 1990 (BEA), which first established statutory PAYGO requirements and expired in 2002, dozens of mandatory programs are exempt from PAYGO requirements.  H.R. 2920 includes all of the exempt mandatory spending programs under BEA and adds mandatory programs passed since 2002, such as the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), to the exempt list.  Under the bill, more than 100 mandatory spending programs are exempt from statutory PAYGO requirements.

Broad exemptions under today’s bill make true spending reforms irrelevant and pave the way for significant increases in federal spending.