White House: Obama to lay out spending plan

WASHINGTON -- One budget deal down, President Barack Obama and Congress began to pivot Sunday from the painful standoff over this year's spending to a pair of defining debates over the nation's borrowing limit and the election-year budget.

Much will be revealed at midweek, when the House and Senate are expected to vote on a budget for the remainder of this fiscal year and Obama reveals his plan to reduce the deficit, in part by scaling back programs for seniors and the poor. Across the dial Sunday, messengers from both parties framed the series of spending fights as debates over cuts -- a thematic victory for House Republicans swept to power by a populist mandate for smaller, more austere government.

Presidential adviser David Plouffe said Obama has long been committed to finding ways for the nation to spend within its means. He confirmed that the president would unveil more specifics for deficit reduction with a speech Wednesday that would reveal plans to reduce the government's chief health programs for seniors and the poor.

"You're going to have to look at Medicare and Medicaid and see what kind of savings you can get," Obama adviser David Plouffe said Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press."

Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, the top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, called Obama's planned speech "an apparent recognition that the budget plan he submitted to Congress ... fails to address our dire fiscal challenges."

The presidential speech Wednesday is part of official Washington's shift from the standoff over spending through September to next year's budget and beyond. Alone and together, the prospects of raising the debt ceiling and passing a 2012 spending plan are politically perilous, a knot that lawmakers will spend the coming months trying to unravel.

Sunday congressional officials still were analyzing Friday's 348-70 vote to fund the government through the week. Operating under it, aides were putting to paper the longer-term bipartisan accord to fund the government through September. It wasn't clear that the vote would remain the same on the spending bill for the next six months.

The late hour of Friday's handshake left lawmakers little time to react. House members of both parties who voted for the funding through the week could not say Sunday that they'd vote for the plan to fund the government through September.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., who voted "yes" Friday to extend funding this week while the final compromise was written, said he was nonetheless undecided on whether he'd vote for the final deal.

On the other side of the aisle, Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., also a "yes" vote on Friday, would not commit to voting for the six-month deal either.

Friday's tally also offered a look at Republicans likely to be the staunchest opponents of any compromises on spending and policy.

Twenty-eight of the "no" votes were cast by Republicans. Sixteen of those are members of the 87-member freshman class. Also voting no: Tea Party star Michele Bachmann, R-Minn.

Republicans said Friday night's deal in no way means they're ready to compromise on the fiscal debates ahead, starting with the House Republicans' $3.5 trillion spending plan for next year.