War Bill Delayed Until After Recess
May 22, 2008 – 9:40 p.m.
By David Clarke and Liriel Higa, CQ Staff
http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?parm1=3&docID=news-000002882694 [1]
The House will wait until after the Memorial Day recess to face the potentially difficult task of clearing the supplemental war spending measure, which the Senate sent over in a slimmed-down version on Thursday.
The challenge for House Democratic leaders lies in the opposition of House Republicans and fiscally conservative Democrats to different portions of the bill, which includes $165 billion for emergency war spending and additional billions for domestic items, including an expanded veterans’ benefit to which the Senate gave its approval Thursday.
The White House joined Republican lawmakers in criticizing Democrats for not sending a clean war funding bill to President Bush before Memorial Day.
“It’s disappointing and irresponsible that Congress has failed to complete action on a bill that funds our troops prior to Memorial Day,” said Jim Nussle , director of the Office of Management and Budget. “Our men and women in uniform deserve better than having essential wartime resources held hostage to billions in unrelated spending.”
But Democratic leaders insisted that the troops would not be adversely affected by their plan to wait until after the recess to vote.
Before the Senate sent the bill to the House, it struck Iraq policy provisions from its war funding language, including a non-binding provision calling for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq by June 2009.
Earlier in the week, in an attempt to make it harder for Republicans to object and for Bush to veto the measure, the Senate also eliminated a number of authorizing provisions, including one to grant temporary H-2A visas allowing immigrants to hold agricultural jobs for up to five years.
Bill Exceeds Bush Request by Billions
The Senate concurred with the domestic funding amendment by a vote of 75-22. It concurred with the war funding amendment, 70-26, after effectively rejecting an amendment with war spending and policy provisions, including the withdrawal timeline, by a vote of 34-63.
But the Senate version still includes a number of items Bush did not request, including about $10 billion in additional discretionary spending, along with an extension of unemployment benefits, the delay of seven Medicaid rules proposed by the Bush administration and an expanded veterans benefit program a?? a proposal by Jim Webb, D-Va., that has broad bipartisan backing.
A notable omission in the Senate version was a 0.47 percent surtax that would have raised $54 billion over 10 years to pay for the veterans’ benefits. The surtax, which would have been imposed on adjusted gross income in excess of $500,000 for individuals or $1 million for joint filers, was included by House leadership after fiscally conservative “Blue Dog” Democrats balked at including the expanded veterans’ benefits without offsets.
A Blue Dog decision to vote against the domestic spending could lead to its defeat. When the House voted on its amendment for domestic programs, which included the surtax, it was adopted, 256-166, with 32 Republicans in support and seven Democrats opposed. The Blue Dog Coalition has 47 members and generally supported the amendment, so a mass defection would make the vote uncertain.
‘The Irresponsible Senate’
Blue Dogs were highly critical of the Senate but said they would have to meet after the recess to discuss how to vote.
“The irresponsible Senate,” said Blue Dog Allen Boyd of Florida. “I guess we’ll just have to dip into the Republic of China kitty again until they say no,” he said, referring to the money the United States must borrow to fund the government.
Blue Dog John Tanner of Tennessee said that the Senate put the House in a tough spot. “You’re in a position now of truly having to cast a vote you don’t want to cast against our veterans because of the Senate,” he said.
But other supporters of the domestic spending were buoyed by the strong Senate vote in favor of the items.
Democrats had been planning to strip everything except Webb’s veterans’ proposal if they had not achieved the 60 votes necessary. That would have given members who supported the veterans’ benefits — but not the other added spending — the opportunity to vote for just the veterans’ program.
But the 75 votes in favor of the combination included 25 Republicans — a significant expression of support from across the aisle that Democrats were quick to trumpet.
“The U.S. Senate today made a strong statement by rejecting the president’s misplaced priorities and supporting this domestic funding with a veto-proof majority,” said Senate Appropriations Chairman Robert C. Byrd , D-W.Va., in a statement.
Lawmakers also said that strong showing would make it harder for Bush to veto the bill.
Sen. John Cornyn , R-Texas, who voted against the domestic funding, said, “I guess the temptation to add other pet projects was just irresistible, and people were skittish about the vote on the GI Bill. So I think all that combined produced the result you saw.”
Republicans Plot Strategy
House Republicans defeated the war funding amendment last week to protest the spending unrelated to the war as well as the lack of a markup, with 132 Republicans voting “present.” The tally was close, 141-149. Republicans knew at the time that the Senate would restore the war funding, so their vote was largely symbolic.
If Democrats are able to adopt the domestic amendment, Republicans could again vote “present” on the war funding and force Democrats to come up with the votes to adopt it. Mike Pence , R-Ind., who came up with the idea of the protest vote, said that he would have to discuss with members and leadership how they would vote. But he added: “Our first priority is to make sure our soldiers have the resources they need.”
David R. Obey , D-Wis., chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, refused to predict how the House would act.
“It ain’t over until the fat lady sings,” he said. “We’ll have to see what happens.”
Another option would be for the House to amend the bill further and send it back to the Senate.
Obey had tried to write the House version with minimal unrelated items to make it difficult for Bush to veto the measure. When asked whether the Senate move would make the bill easier for Bush to veto, he said, “I find it hard to believe in the end that he will veto what we send him.”
CQ © 2007 All Rights Reserved | Congressional Quarterly Inc. | 1255 22nd Street N.W. Washington, D.C. 20037 | 202-419-8500