Another group is launching a campaign to revive a national conversation on a balanced budget amendment.
The Center for Individual Freedom (CFIF) announced Thursday the formation of the “One More Vote Campaign” project — an allusion to 1995 when a constitutional amendment fell short just one vote in the Senate.
Jeff Mazzella, the president of CFIF, told reporters on a conference call Thursday that “in talking with grassroots,” he thinks “the climate” is right for such a proposal to take off.
“Well, there’s certainly the elections coming up and a lot of people are focused that … but then what? What do we do? And this is a proposal that is easy to understand, that the people could grab on to. And we hope that just the debate around it will force Congress to start addressing the tougher issues they refuse to address,” Mazzella said.
Troy Senik, a former speechwriter for President George W. Bush and a senior fellow at CFIF, said the group will push for Congress to pass a balanced federal budget every year, except when 60 percent of those in Congress extend the debt ceiling in response to a national emergency.
Last month, The Daily Caller reported that a coalition of Tea Party groups called BBA Now, as in Balance Budget Amendment Now, is developing a three-year plan to petition 2010 congressional candidates, as well as presidential candidates in 2012, to sign a pledge in support of a balanced budget amendment.