Super Committee Democrats Bring $2.3 Trillion Counteroffer

Democrats have brought a $2.3 trillion offer to the table, in the ongoing back and forth over how to the budget deficit super committee should lop $1.2 trillion off the federal deficit over the next decade. Republicans immediately rejected the proposal.

The proposal cuts spending by $1 trillion, raises $1 trillion in revenue and saves $300 billion in interest payments, aides told The Wall Street Journal.

The Democrats brought the offer days after a $1.2 trillion Republican plan emerged that would cut the deficit via the elimination of tax deductions and cuts.

Part of Back and Forth's

The move is the latest in a round of back and forth's between the parties, as the 12 members of the committee try to reach a deal in 13 days.

Congress' super committee, formally known as the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, was established as part of a deficit reduction deal, the Budget Control Act, in exchange for raising the nation's debt ceiling on Aug. 2. While the U.S. government was allowed to borrow up to $2.4 trillion more through 2013, the super committee was charged with reaching a bipartisan consensus on at least $1.2 trillion in deficit reduction over the next decade, in addition to the roughly $900 billion in deficit reduction Congressional Republicans and President Barack Obama agreed to as part of the August debt deal.

Congress then has until Dec. 23 to pass the committee's recommendations, otherwise trigger cuts, in the form of painful slashes to defense spending and Medicare benefits, would be automatically enacted.