The federal government reopened after a 16-day shutdown last week, and as part of the compromise that will fund the government going forward (at least until January), Congress has established a bi-partisan budget conference committee to try to work out a long-term budget deal by December 13.
The 29-member committee is made up of lawmakers from both Chambers of Congress, and has been tasked with the difficult job of reconciling House and Senate budget proposals that were passed earlier in the year. In order to give taxpayers some insight into who these Members are and what sort of spending (or saving) proposals they've supported in the past, NTUF compiled data from our BillTally project -- which tracks the budgetary impact of all legislation introduced in Congress -- for each Member. The average Democratic committee member supported, on net, $276 million in budget increases, while the average Republican member proposed $271 million in net budget cuts.
For a breakdown by Member, check out the table in the latest issue, available online here.
Also in this week's issue is a breakdown of the possible costs taxpayers might be facing after Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) authorized military transport for Congressmen to attend former Rep. Bill Young's (R-FL) funeral on Thursday in Largo, FL. Few details about the trip's logistics were disclosed, but some of the planes used to transport Members in the past have carried a cost per flight hour ranging anywhere from $15,000 to as high as $43,000. More info is available in the Tab.
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