Palm Beach Post - Cutting Deficit by $200 Billion First Bill from Rep. Murphy's Bipartisan Freshmen

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By George Bennett

It's a small fish -- literally -- in the federal government's ocean of red ink.

But eliminating a catfish inspection program administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture is one "baby step" toward reducing the deficit and improving cooperation between Democrats and Republicans in Washington, says freshman U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy, D-Jupiter.

After working with a bipartisan group of rookie House members, Murphy and Rep. David Joyce, R-Ohio, are co-sponsoring a bill that would trim up to $200 billion in federal spending over the next decade by implementing some saving and efficiency measures suggested by the Government Accountability Office.

Murphy and Joyce are scheduled to appear together Friday at a Forum Club of the Palm Beaches lunch to discuss their Savings, Accountability, Value and Efficiency (SAVE) Act.

The bill is the first proposal to emerge from a group of Republican and Democratic House freshmen who call themselves the United Solutions Caucus and have pledged to find common ground on reducing the federal deficit. With Republicans and Democrats polarized on long-term strategies to reduce the deficit, the Murphy-Joyce bill avoids divisive issues like tax hikes or entitlement reform and focuses on some of the least controversial proposals put forward by the GAO.

For instance, the bill would eliminate the USDA's catfish inspection program to save $137 million over 10 years. The GAO says the program duplicates work by the Food and Drug Administration and the National Marine Fisheries Service.

Another provision in the bill would reduce the number of noncompetitive government contracts and put more awards out to bid, which the GAO says would save $80 billion over 10 years. An additional $50 billion in savings would come from increasing bulk-buying by the government.

Improving data collection and analysis to ferret out more Medicare and Medicaid fraud would save another $33 billion. Consolidating government data centers would save $10 billion.

The potential $200 billion overall savings in the Murphy-Joyce bill add up to about 3 percent of the $6.3 trillion in deficits that are expected to accumulate over the next decade, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. This year's deficit is $642 billion and the national debt stands at $16.7 trillion.

"It's baby steps," Murphy says of the spending cuts in his bill.

But he hopes those steps lead to a bigger bipartisan agreement on the budget.

"Part of our freshmen group, part of United Solutions, is building trust," Murphy said. "You build trust along the way and at the end of the day, that's the framework for a grand bargain."

In addition to being the key to a budget deal, bipartisanship is vital to Murphy's political future. His Palm Beach-Treasure Coast district is one of only nine in the nation that was carried by Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney but elected a Democratic House member. The national GOP has made defeating Murphy a top priority for 2014.

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