OMB chief denies White House planning steep budget cuts

Office of Management and Budget Director Joshua Bolten Thursday flatly denied that a document calling on agencies to assume budget cuts for fiscal 2006 represents future administration policy, contending that it was largely "formulaic" and constructed without new policy input from the White House.

"This is our initial process document to get the planning started," Bolten told CongressDaily. "It involves no policy decisions but rather is what the computer spits out to get the process started, and we begin a negotiation from there with the agencies and the White House -- making judgments about where the priorities need to be, where the spending needs to be focused."

The document, which The Washington Post reported was a May 19 memorandum from the White House, indicated agencies in charge of domestic spending should assume spending cuts as they prepare their fiscal 2006 budgets this summer.