The White House Office of Management and Budget will begin "discussions" with federal agencies on the across-the-board spending cuts set to occur in five months, despite the Obama administration's insistence that Congress must stop the so-called sequestration.

The announcement marks the beginning of what has been a slow process in planning for the deep cuts, which Congress set into motion with its debt ceiling deal last August. The White House has repeatedly warned that the $1.2 trillion in cuts would wreak havoc on national security and domestic programs.

In a memo to agencies yesterday, OMB acting Director Jeffrey Zients wrote that his office would consult with agencies on what programs might be exempted from the cuts and how the sequestration would affect budgetary reporting requirements. As the sequestration gets closer -- and if Congress neglects to act -- OMB will start calculating how much each agency will have to cut its budget.

"The steps described above are necessary to prepare for the contingency of having to issue a sequestration order, but they do not change the fact that sequestration is bad policy, was never meant to be implemented, and should be avoided through the enactment of bipartisan, balanced deficit legislation," Zients wrote. "The Administration urges the Congress to take this course."

The memo came the same day that Zients announced that appropriations for military personnel would be exempted from the sequester.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) called the memo and the announcement "further proof" that the Obama administration is trying to keep the public in the dark about the sequestration before the November elections. He pointed to the Department of Labor's guidance earlier this week that called it "inappropriate" for federal contractors to send 60-day layoff notices to employees in preparation for the January sequester.

"Not a week seems to pass that we don't see more evidence of this president's contempt for the private sector. And here's the latest: The federal government is told to prepare for cuts, yet private sector businesses are specifically told it would be 'inappropriate' to tell people they could lose their jobs," McConnell said this morning on the Senate floor.

He later added: "[H]ere's the administration's message: If you're in the public sector, prepare for cuts. If you're in the private sector, don't even warn your employees their jobs may be on the line."

Agencies have stayed mostly silent on how, and whether, they are planning for the sequester. But it would mean a cut of more than 8 percent to U.S. EPA, the Energy Department and the Interior Department at a time when their budgets are already being squeezed. Environmental groups have begun pressuring Congress to avert the cuts (E&E Daily, July 13).

Lawmakers also seem to be starting to acknowledge the potential effects of such deep spending cuts. Last week, Congress sent a bill to President Obama's desk that requires the White House to produce a detailed report of how the cuts will affect agencies (E&E Daily, July 26).

Obama has maintained that he is confident the sequester won't happen. And Zients, in his memo, referred to the unnecessary cost of developing sequestration plans that would never have to be implemented if Congress developed an alternative to the across-the-board cuts.