Bush rejects $5.1 billion emergency fund

Taking a stand on what he sees as congressional overspending, President Bush Tuesday said he would not release $5.1 billion in contingent emergency spending from the recently signed $28.9 billion supplemental appropriations bill for fiscal 2002.

The announcement at an economic forum in Texas drew jeers from congressional appropriators. A statement by Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee said the decision would "slash funding for critical homeland security, war-related and foreign operations needs."

But House conservatives welcomed the move. "With increased federal deficits now estimated at over $150 billion, a war and economic uncertainty, the government cannot afford to spend money on items that are not absolutely essential," Rep. John Shadegg, R-Ariz., chairman of the conservative House Republican Study Committee, said in a statement. "The president's announcement sends a clear signal to those who want to continue to waste more and more of the taxpayers' money that excessive spending will not be tolerated."

But while the anti-pork message might be good public relations for the moment, some of the money in the contingency fund was specifically requested by the administration-such as $200 million in aid to Israel and $50 million for Palestinian refugees.

Other parts of the package, such as $200 million for global AIDS relief, were implicitly endorsed. The fund also would have released spending for such popular programs as veterans' medical care, nuclear security and a bipartisan election reform proposal endorsed by House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill.

Bush said the administration will ask Congress to restore money for Israel, the Palestinians, and AIDS through the regular 2003 appropriations process-although it remains unclear whether the funds would move as a separate supplemental or receive an emergency designation so that the money would not have to count toward the spending totals adopted in the House "deeming" resolution or the allocations laid out by Senate Appropriations Chairman Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va.

The Senate has already written its fiscal 2003 spending bills and moved them out of committee, meaning funds would have to be reconfigured significantly to accommodate new spending. In the House, many 2003 appropriations bills have yet to be written and are pressured by tight allocations.

Moreover, some members of Congress may not want to expend the political capital necessary to try to re-fund programs that the president labeled as wasteful.

"The question is, will it become more difficult to do it a second time and allow Republicans to be labeled as big spenders by Democratic foes?" asked one House Appropriations Committee GOP aide.