White House looking to break logjam on military, VA spending bill

The White House is trying to mediate a dispute between Republican conservatives and appropriators on the fate of a roughly $136 billion fiscal 2007 Military Quality of Life and Veterans Affairs spending bill.

All sides agree it is imperative to pass the bill before lawmakers' scheduled adjournment Thursday. But it hangs in the balance because of lingering distrust between conservatives and appropriators. The Appropriations committees have not been negotiating the bill since Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., and others blocked it from going to conference Nov. 14, after unanimous Senate passage.

DeMint and others say they would allow the bill to pass as part of the continuing resolution Congress must pass next week, but that a separate, un-amendable conference report is out of the question.

"It's ridiculous to say Sen. DeMint ever opposed the [military and veterans] bill; in fact, he has fully supported its passage from the outset. What he opposed was allowing big spenders from both parties to use our veterans as cover for a porked-up omnibus," a DeMint spokesman said.

Appropriators say they never intended to pass an omnibus and have argued for two years to pass all spending bills individually. The White House is mounting a late-inning push to pass the bill.

"We do hope that [the bill] is something perhaps we can get over the goal line," a senior administration official said. Office of Management and Budget Director Rob Portman has been working the phones, sources said, including a call to DeMint Thursday.

GOP leaders want to pass the bill but acknowledge the logistical difficulties. "Hope springs eternal, but the clock is just about to strike midnight on the 109th Congress," said Bill Hoagland, a top aide to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn. He said Tuesday would be the latest negotiations could wrap up to get the paperwork together in time.

"At this point, trying to produce a conference report by next week would be almost impossible," a House Appropriations Committee spokesman said.

In the event the bill cannot be completed, appropriations aides and White House officials said the Veterans Affairs Department would have enough money to fund medical expenses at least through Feb. 15, which is when the new CR will expire.

"Our preference is to get the bill done," but the VA has around $500 million in unspent funds it can use in the interim, the administration official said. "They've assured us they will be fine [through Feb. 15]," a House Appropriations spokesman said.

The administration official said the CR would contain adjustments to ease the impact on other agencies, as programs would be funded at the lower of the House- or Senate-passed or last year's enacted levels. Without such "anomalies," Justice Department administrative expenses would be cut 60 percent from fiscal 2006, after amendments were added on the House floor to the fiscal 2007 Science-State-Justice spending bill, for example.

While expressing some sympathy for an earmark-free, yearlong CR as advocated by conservatives, the administration official said "on net, we conclude it's better to get the bills done" because under a CR programs the White House proposed to terminate would continue while priorities like the American Competitiveness math and science initiative would suffer.