Third District Congressman Nick Rahall says he thinks at least some of the automatic federal spending cuts, called the sequester, will start taking effect next week.
He says it will be several months, though, before the worst of the cuts hit.
“Perhaps, if those devastating effects are felt, then it will create a really super emergency and maybe that’s what it’s going to take for Congress to get their act together and reach some kind of compromise on this,” Congressman Rahall said on Friday’s MetroNews Talkline.
He says talks on deficit reduction are continuing among leaders of the U.S. Senate and U.S. of Representatives, along with those from White House, even though Congress is in recess.
As of Friday afternoon, there were no indications a compromise deal is pending with just a week to go until the sequester starts.
In all, the automatic cuts will total $1.2 trillion dollars over the next ten years.
Those cuts were originally scheduled to take effect on January 1st if Congressional leaders could not agree on an alternative deficit reduction plan, but the effective date was pushed back to March 1st. There has been little movement for negotiations since the start of the New Year.
Congressman Rahall says that is not the way to conduct the country’s business.
“We just go from one crisis to the next and the American people are probably becoming immune to all these crises we create in Washington and these self inflicted wounds that we create upon ourselves,” he said.
President Barack Obama has proposed reducing the deficit by $4 million through to cuts to wasteful spending and the elimination of tax loopholes for the wealthy, something Republicans oppose.
The sequester includes cuts to defense, education, small business, food safety, research and mental health treatment. Federal estimates indicate 5% in spending on nondefense programs will be eliminated, while the hit to defense will be 8%.