We’ve highlighted the House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s gutsy remarks on spending, and, as Simmi Aujla reports in The Politico, he is not alone among House Democrats in taking the long-term spending burden seriously.

Reps. Gary Peters, John Adler (D-N.J.), Jim Himes (D-Conn.) and Peter Welch (D-Vt.) are getting more vocal on their concerns about government spending. They’re forming a working group to propose major cuts to spending in areas like defense, energy, housing and agriculture that they say would save about $70 billion over ten years.
“We have been growing increasingly frustrated with the lack of action and talking about specifics and putting those on the table,” Peters said in an interview with POLITICO.

One gets the impression that these “rogue” House Democrats are willing to go further than Hoyer.

Peters’s press secretary, Cullen Schwarz, was more blunt, sounding off after failing to hear back from Hoyer’s office. “Our leadership hasn’t put any serious budget cuts on the table so we had to take matters into our own hands. Long story short: No, we have no support from our leadership, and to this point neither they nor the Republicans have put their money where their mouth is on spending cuts,” he said in an e-mail. “We’re upset.”

Three of the members are from swing districts, which could account for the rhetoric. The group has proposed any serious cuts just yet. On Rep. Himes’s website, I found the following press release:

Four Members of Congress today announced their formation of a new congressional “Spending Cuts and Deficit Reduction Working Group” and unveiled legislation to cut billions of dollars in wasteful spending from the federal budget. Gary Peters (D-MI), chairman of the new working group, Co-chair John Adler (D-NJ), and the groups’ other founding members, Peter Welch (D-VT) and Jim Himes (D-CT), have each sponsored legislation to cut billions in wasteful discretionary spending and subsidies from the energy, treasury and housing and urban development, defense, and agriculture budgets. In total the package’s spending cuts, ending of subsidies and closure of tax loopholes will reduce the deficit by over $70 billion.

Over $70 billion isn’t a trivial sum, exactly. But as the release goes on to state, this is over $70 billion over ten years. As a declaration of seriousness, it’s hard to take this too seriously.

That said, it is something. And very few House Republicans have distinguished themselves on this front either — Rep. Paul Ryan is a rare exception. Fiscal conservatives need allies anywhere they can get them.