Tester wants action to clean budget problems

U.S. Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., talked Thursday about several issues dealing with federal spending, and said he wants to see Congress take action to clean up the budget on both the spending and revenue sides.

"The problem is, we can't get both sides to sit down at the table and look at the expenditures and look at the tax code," he said from Washington during a telephone press conference.

Tester talked about several issues regarding federal spending and budgeting, from cuts proposed to SNAP, formerly known as food stamps, to revising the tax code; from proposed cuts to Essential Air Service in Montana to cuts to logging U.S. Forest Service land.

When asked about SNAP, which will face cuts later this year if Congress doesn't act, Tester said all program funding needs to be looked at.

"Finances are very difficult here in Washington, D.C.," he said. "There are some things that we are going to reduce.

"I am not crazy about reducing food stamps myself, because, No. 1, it uses some ag products, and No. 2, it feeds some people. That's a win-win in Montana," he said. "The bottom line is, we need to look at it. We need to look at the whole budget, as a matter of fact, figure out ways we can make the cuts in the budget so it doesn't starve people but yet it reduces the fat that's in the budget, and there's plenty of waste in the budget that we can cut."

He said Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chair of the Senate Finance Committee, has said he is going to start working on revising the tax code — for the first time since 1986 — and reduce the tax rates and close loopholes to increase revenue.

"I think that's critically important as we move forward," Tester said. "We need to do the same thing on the expenditure side and then we wouldn't have critical programs, which I think SNAP is, on the chopping block."

He said he wants the Obama administration to move carefully with what it does, including planned cuts to the U.S. Forest Service budget.

"I recently warned President Obama not to cut timber sales in the forest service budget," he said, adding he also talked to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack earlier Thursday in a Senate subcommittee hearing about the proposed 15 percent cut to the Forest Service budget in 2014.

"Money is short, and they need to do some cutting," Tester said during the press conference. "I'm not sure cutting timber sales is the right way to go. In fact, I think we need to be increasing timber harvests to better manage our forests, supporting those rural communities and creating jobs, and I think that proposal sets us back."

He said he is hopeful that his bill proposing changes to forest land management in Montana, including increased timber harvests and creation of permanent recreation areas and wilderness areas, will move forward. The new chair of the Senate Energy and Water Committee, Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., is supportive of the bill, and freshman Rep. Steve Daines, R-Mont., is taking a close look at it, Tester said.

While he doesn't know if Daines will support the bill, "the fact that he is open to it, I think, is very, very positive," Tester said.

When asked about possible cuts of EAS air service to Lewistown and Miles City, Tester said he is urging the transportation department to keep the service to rural areas. The problem, he said, is that people aren't using the service, increasing the federal subsidy per passenger.

The use of the service needs to go up, and while he is encouraging the department to keep the service to Miles City and Lewistown, "I don't know that that's going to happen, to be honest with you. Budget times are tough, and that subsidy is huge."