Bush urges Senate to give him line-item veto

President Bush on Tuesday called on the Senate to pass line-item veto legislation, part of a stepped-up White House effort to secure congressional approval of one of Bush's top domestic agenda items of the year.

Bush spoke after meeting with senators at the White House to discuss the issue. He also used his Saturday radio address to call on the Senate to act.

As he did during the successful effort to extract line-item legislation from the House, Office of Management and Budget Director Rob Portman will serve as Bush's point man on the issue as the White House lobbying effort veers toward the Senate, where the legislation has moved through the Budget Committee but not yet found its way to the floor.

Portman will reprise his House efforts, which included meetings with lawmakers as well as efforts to motivate activists on the issue.

Bush sought to frame the issue as a bipartisan imperative, pointing to the support for the line item by Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., and mentioning that one of the senators he met with this morning, Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., had said the line-item veto was an effective tool for him when he was governor.

"I think it makes sense for a Republican president to have a line-item veto, and I think it makes sense for a Democrat president to have a line-item veto," Bush said. "And I urge the United States Senate to pass this important legislation so we can reconcile whatever differences there are between the House and the Senate version, and show the people that we are serious about being responsible with their money."

In a sign that the White House might have its work cut out for it in trying to forge bipartisan support, the package containing the line-item veto passed the Senate Budget Committee on a party-line vote. Bush on Tuesday left other elements of the package out of his remarks, focusing on the line-item veto.

In remarks to regional reporters last Wednesday, Portman called the legislation passed by the Senate Budget Committee "a very good package," but he indicated that if it cannot get enough votes to get cloture, then he hoped that "at least we could move the line-item veto."

In addition to Nelson, Tuesday's meeting with Bush included Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., Budget Chairman Judd Gregg, R-N.H., Appropriations Chairman Thad Cochran, R-Miss., and Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine; Christopher (Kit) Bond, R-Mo., and John McCain, R-Ariz.