A “supercommittee” of 12 members of Congress has been appointed by Congressional leaders to hash out the details of the deficit reduction deal agreed to by Congress and President Obama in raising the limit on the national debt. If the committee fails to come up with a package of spending cuts and/or tax increases, spending cuts specified in the debt deal will go into effect.
The committee includes three Democrats and three Republicans from the House and the Senate each. They are:
Sen. Max Baucus, D-MT
Sen. John Kerry, D-MA
Sen. Patty Murray, D-WA
Sen. John Kyl, R-AZ
Sen. Rob Portman, R-OH
Sen. Pat Toomey, R-PA
Rep. Xavier Becerra, D-CA
Rep. James E. Clyburn, D-SC
Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-MD
Rep. Dave Camp, R-MI
Rep. Jeb Hensarling, R-TX
Rep. Fred Upton, R-MI
The committee is expected to begin its work in September and is supposed to report by late November. It is expected to recommend over a trillion dollars in spending reductions or tax increases, or a combination of the two, to meet the requirement of the debt-ceiling bill. Otherwise spending cuts divided between military and domestic programs will go into effect.
