Senate nixes bid to boost Homeland Security spending
Senators on Thursday rejected, 51-43, an attempt to waive federal budget restrictions to add $2 billion in transit, rail and other homeland security priorities to the $32 billion fiscal 2005 Homeland Security appropriations bill.
Senate Appropriations ranking member Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., proposed the additions as debate continued on the Homeland Security spending measure, which may reach a final vote next Wednesday before Congress takes a break for Rosh Hashana. When passed, the bill would be only the second appropriations bill completed by the Senate, with 11 more yet to be done. The chamber already has ignored one veto threat from the White House on the Homeland Security bill by adopting an amendment to prevent outsourcing of some government jobs to the private sector. The labor-backed amendment passed 49-47 Wednesday with GOP support.
Senate Appropriations Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, is attempting to negotiate time agreements for floor consideration of remaining spending bills, as subcommittees continue marking up through Tuesday of next week.
The fiscal 2005 Military Construction and Legislative Branch bills are ready for the floor, and Stevens said he hoped to swiftly approve them next week while moving other bills out of committee. Thus far, the plan is to move spending bills through "regular order," a top Senate GOP aide said, despite the time crunch before the scheduled Oct. 8 departure date.
Because many Senate Republicans want to wrap up the appropriations process by then and adjourn for the year, that goal would likely necessitate sending unfinished bills straight to conference near the end of September, to clear the decks for consideration of legislation overhauling intelligence programs. Until then, the Senate would try to grind through as many individual bills as possible, as Stevens is now armed with 302(b) numbers for each bill to raise if proposals to increase spending are offered on the floor.
The pace of action is considerably accelerated in the House, which has already completed 10 spending bills and is aiming to complete a $142.5 billion fiscal 2005 Labor-HHS spending bill today. The House is scheduled to vote on another labor-backed amendment to block new Labor Department regulations on overtime compensation. The White House has threatened a veto if the amendment were to pass.
House GOP leaders are preparing to bring up the fiscal 2005 Transportation-Treasury spending bill next week, but the future of the final VA-HUD measure is unclear. House leaders are skeptical about their ability to finish appropriations and adjourn for the year next month.
"I don't think we've given up yet on the idea we can get these done before the election," House Majority Whip Roy Blunt, R-Mo., told reporters Thursday.
However, Blunt conceded that added time constraints in both the House and the Senate from the intelligence reform "may make it impossible to do before the election."
A House GOP appropriations aide called the idea of going straight to conference on unfinished bills to expedite work "ham-handed," noting that Senate Democrats were sure to object. Regardless, lawmakers may have to return in November to act on legislation to increase the statutory debt limit.