OMB Details Plans for Obama Spending Freeze

The OMB has announced an across-the-board, top-line hard spending freeze in the federal budget.

Pell grants will be unaffected, as will job creation measures before congress for fiscal 2010 because the freeze would take effect in October, the beginning of the government’s fiscal 2011.

Poverty assistance and head start programs will not be adjusted for inflation as they will be subject to a hard freeze.

Deputy OMB Director Rob Nabors said that OMB accountants had been poring over the federal budget line by line, searching for potential savings.

He compared the OMB’s process to a family hit hard by recession trimming its budget. “You don’t say ‘I’m going to spend 10% less on food, 10% less on utilities, 10% less on clothes,” he said, drawing a parallel to essential programs and major white house legislative priorities. “You might say ‘we can’t afford to go to the movies on Saturday nights anymore.”

Top presidential priorities that Nabors mentioned include strengthening America’s 21st century economy, clean energy, and education. He stated that specific programs would be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

When asked how he expected the proposed spending freeze to navigate Congress intact despite heavy opposition from liberal Democrats, Nabors quoted President Obama. He recounted a story where the President was facing criticism of his health care initiatives, to which he responded “Don’t bet against me.”