Balanced Budget Amendment

Senate Dems Align Against GOP Balanced Budget Amendment

Brian Beutler | December 14, 2011, 1:12PM

From right: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and Sen. John Thune, (R-SD).

A provision in this summer's debt limit bill required both the House and Senate to vote on a version -- any version -- of a constitutional amendment requiring the federal government to maintain a balanced budget.

Today was the day in the Senate, and as it turns out two balanced budget amendments went down in flames. One, crafted by Sen. Mark Udall (D-CO), was designed to give Dems who wanted to vote for some kind of BBA a vehicle to support. It would have explicitly protected Social Security from being raided to balance the budget, and a ban on cutting taxes for millionaires unless there's a budget surplus. It failed 21-79 -- far short of the two-thirds supermajority required to pass a constitutional amendment.

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