Unlike past years, the House has no obligation to vote on a budget because both chambers agreed months ago on how much to spend in fiscal 2019. | Getty House GOP budget sets up massive safety net cuts, Obamacare repeal bid

House Republican budget writers debuted an ambitious deficit-reduction plan Tuesday that would force GOP committees to cut at least $302 billion over a decade and potentially lay the groundwork for another repeal vote on Obamacare.

The GOP's sweeping budget plan is the first step toward a filibuster-proof bill that could result in real reductions to popular programs like federal student aid or low-income family block grants.


It could also deliver on conservatives' decades-old promise to rein in entitlement programs like Medicare and Medicaid.

But that proposal faces long odds in the House, let alone the Senate, where moderates have balked at previous calls to rein in so-called entitlement programs. Republican leaders in either chamber have shown little interest in pursuing a welfare reform agenda in an already tough election year.

If approved in both chambers, nearly a dozen House panels would be required to draft legislation by year’s end to dramatically slash funding for mandatory programs under their purview.

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"For the first time in a long time, we’re going to try to move this narrative back to the mandatory side of spending," Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.), the House's first-term budget chief, told reporters Tuesday.

He pointed out that mandatory programs, which can't be touched through Congress' regular spending cycle, now make up 70 percent of total government spending.

The biggest task would fall on the House Ways and Means Committee, which is asked to cut $150 billion over a decade from a slew of programs, including Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and Supplemental Security Income.

In a win for many conservatives, the House budget would also leave an opening for repealing and replacing Obamacare through the separate fast-track process of budget reconciliation. The two committees that oversee most Obamacare programs — Ways and Means and Energy and Commerce — both receive reconciliation instructions, though there are no specifics about policy.

Another Obamacare battle, however, could prove politically toxic for the two dozen House Republicans who are up for reelection in districts that carried Hillary Clinton in 2016 — the same seats likely to determine control of the House in November.

The GOP budget also sets up potential cuts to federal retirement benefits, Dodd-Frank oversight and federal student loans by giving big saving targets for the Education and the Workforce, Oversight and Financial Services committees.

Farm subsidies probably wouldn't be targeted, though. The budget would require the House Agriculture Committee to come up with just $1 billion in savings over a decade, though that committee oversees hundreds of billions of dollars in farm subsidies criticized by conservative groups.

Those mandatory spending cuts — unlike the rest of the largely symbolic proposal — could actually become law. But first, every single GOP senator, including several moderates, would need to back the idea, a politically unfeasible outcome, particularly in an election year.

A nearly identical group of GOP senators already rejected a similar approach last year, when House Republicans sought roughly $200 billion in mandatory cuts alongside their push to overhaul the tax code.

Ultimately, House Republicans swallowed the Senate's version of that budget plan, which allowed for a $1.5 trillion increase in the deficit over a decade to account for expansive individual and corporate tax breaks.

Womack has spent weeks shaping the proposal, which would get committee approval only with the support of nearly every GOP member of the panel.

The makeup of the House Budget Committee, which is packed with fiscal hawks like Reps. Rob Woodall (R-Ga.) and Dave Brat (R-Va.), is far different than the broader House GOP conference.

Speaker Paul Ryan and his deputies have made no promises that Womack’s GOP budget resolution will make it to the floor.

Womack wouldn't say if he expected the GOP budget proposal to get a floor vote. But he, and a handful of other budget writers standing by his side, vowed to make the case.

"I would hope that I’m not the lone ranger on this," Womack said.

Unlike past years, the House has no obligation to vote on a budget because both chambers agreed months ago on how much to spend in fiscal 2019.

The new fiscal plan reflects that same level of discretionary funding, $1.2 trillion, as laid out under the February budget deal, H.R. 1892 (115).

In future years, however, the House GOP budget would dramatically reduce spending for domestic programs while slowing the growth of the Pentagon’s budget.

Over 10 years, Womack’s plan would slash $8.1 trillion, going far beyond the White House’s budget request, which would add $7 trillion to the deficit over the same time frame.

The GOP budget is not as extreme as the plan released last week by Heritage Action, which would reduce the federal deficit by $11.9 trillion over a decade.

House Democrats will attempt to pin the Republican budget writers on politically poisonous positions, including food stamp cuts and Medicare changes, during this week's markup.

Rep. John Yarmuth of Kentucky, the top Democrat on the budget panel, said he joked with Womack that the GOP budget would benefit Democrats more than Republicans in the House.

“I said, 'I hope you do it, because that will actually give us much more ammunition.’ He said, ‘Yeah I know,'" Yarmuth told reporters Tuesday.