President Obama on Tuesday signed a law requiring the White House budget office to reveal exactly how automatic budget cuts looming in January 2013 will be carried out.
The Sequestration Transparency Act was passed by the House in July by a 414-2 vote. The Senate approved it unanimously later in the month.
Under last August’s debt-ceiling deal, $109 billion in automatic spending cuts are to hit in January to punish politicians for failing to come up with a bipartisan deficit-reduction plan last year as part of the supercommittee process.
The administration must issue its report to Congress in 30 days. The report will come close to the election and could focus the debate on the ballooning deficit and looming cuts to defense — two themes that Mitt Romney has been emphasizing in his campaign against Obama.
In total, sequestration will require $1 trillion in cuts over 10 years to reduce the deficit. Roughly half of those cuts would be made to defense spending.
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