Obama to release budget a month late

President Obama will deliver his fiscal 2015 budget a month late.

The budget, officially due on the first Monday in February, will come out on March 4, the White House said Thursday.

An official said work on the proposal was delayed by the two-year budget deal that Congress passed in December and the omnibus spending bill that was passed this month.

{mosads}“The President’s 2015 Budget will be released on March 4. Now that Congress has finished its work on this year’s appropriations, the Administration is able to finalize next year’s Budget. We are moving to complete the Budget as quickly as possible to help Congress return to regular order in the annual budget process,” budget office spokesman Steve Posner said in a statement.

Last year, Obama delivered his budget on April 8, more than two months late and after the House and Senate had passed their own blueprints. The administration blamed that delay on the early January resolution of the “fiscal cliff” fight.

Obama has met the official budget deadline only once during his time in office.

Budget committee member Rep. Diane Black (R-Tenn.), who helped negotiate the December budget pact as a conference committee member, blasted Obama for the delay.

“This is another sad reminder of just how unserious this president is about tackling our nation’s fiscal challenges, and I hope this does not signal a return to years past where Senate Democrats fail to pass a budget plan at all,” she said.

“My House Republican colleagues and I will continue to lead the fight for fiscal discipline by working to pass a timely budget that addresses out of control Washington spending to secure our nation’s finances for future generations.”

Under the budget deal passed last year by Congress, discretionary spending for 2015 is already set at $1.014 trillion. That means congressional appropriators will be able to start crafting their 12 annual bills before Obama delivers his budget request.

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has said he will produce a budget blueprint this year, but it remains unclear whether the Senate will unveil its own budget resolution. Last year, the Senate passed a budget for the first time in four years after Congress imposed a “no budget, no pay” law. That law is no longer in effect this year. 

Ryan in a statement said that he hopes Obama “uses the extra time to prepare a budget with real solutions, instead of more spending, higher taxes, and dangerous levels of debt.”

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said this week that it will release its annual budget update, which serves as a yardstick to measure competing budget proposals, on Feb. 4.

Last updated at 3:40 p.m.