Obama talks budget with congressional leaders

President Obama visited Capitol Hill today to meet with Democrats to rally support behind his 3.6 trillion dollar budget.

Top Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee, Kent Conrad, made major cuts to Obama's blueprint, but downplayed the differences:

CONRAD: “We have preserved the President’s budget policies: the economy, health care, energy, and middle class tax cuts.”

But Conrad's cuts stripped from Obama's budget an 800 dollar tax cut for working families passed in the stimulus. Conrad also removed a controversial carbon cap-and-trade program from Obama's budget. Overall, the cuts result in a 600 billion dollar reduction over 5 years.

At yesterday evening's prime time press conference, Obama said he expects the budget priorities to remain the same.

OBAMA: "When it comes to the middle-class tax cut, we already had that in the recovery.  We know that that's going to be in place for at least the next two years.  We had identified a specific way to pay for it.  If Congress has better ideas in terms of how to pay for it, then we're happy to listen. When it comes to cap and trade, the broader principle is that we've got to move to a new energy era, and that means moving away from polluting energy sources towards cleaner energy sources.  That is a potential engine for economic growth.  I think cap and trade is the best way, from my perspective, to achieve some of those gains because what it does is it starts pricing the pollution that's being sent into the atmosphere."

Obama said he understood that changes must be made to win the necessary support of enough lawmakers for it to pass. Republicans call the budget proposals too expensive. The House and Senate budget Committees are writing the budget today and tomorrow.

Click here for the full newscast for Wednesday, March 25, 2009