Senate rejects GOP attempts to cut omnibus funding

Senate Democrats Tuesday rebuffed two attempts by Republicans to cut funds from a $410 billion fiscal 2009 omnibus spending bill, including a proposal from Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, to limit the overall funding increase in the bill over fiscal 2008 spending to the rate of inflation.

The omnibus is made up of the nine fiscal 2009 appropriations bills Congress has not approved. Federal programs under the bill are being funded by a continuing resolution at fiscal 2008 levels. The CR expires Friday.

Republicans have questioned the need for the bill, which comes on the heels of enactment of a $787 billion economic stimulus package. The bill would increase spending by about 8 percent, or roughly $30 billion.

Hutchison's amendment, defeated 55-40, would have sent the bill back to the Senate Appropriations Committee, where "we would take out the amount of spending that is duplicative or nonessential, in the amount of approximately $12 billion," or about 3.8 percent, Hutchison said. "This is a very modest cut, but it would put us on the road toward some fiscal responsibility."

The Senate's action came after the chamber defeated, 61-33, an amendment by Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., that would have sent the omnibus back to the Appropriations Committee to make about $30 billion in cuts, which would effectively freeze spending at fiuscal 2008 levels.

"It will be up to [the] Appropriations Committee," where to make the cuts, Ensign said. "But [the] bottom line is that this amendment would at least start down the road to fiscal responsibility to future generations."

Ensign argued that adding to the deficit -- which the Congressional Budget Office in January put at $1.2 trillion for fiscal 2009 -- could make foreign governments think twice before buying U.S. debt and threaten the value of the dollar.

Appropriations Chairman Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, urged the Senate to defeat the amendment and argued that "the measure before us ... is consistent with the funding levels approved in the budget resolution. Therefore, I sincerely believe that there is no justification for any amendment to reopen this bill to further cuts."

According to a bipartisan analysis of the spending in the omnibus and the stimulus by the Appropriations Committee, there are 900 programs in the omnibus bill and fewer than 20 percent receive stimulus funds.

"For those who may want to offer an across-the-board cut to this bill, they would be harming more than 80 percent of the programs for the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Justice, Treasury, HUD, Energy and so on," Inouye said, citing the report. "Of the programs with stimulus funds, only 100 have an increase in the fiscal 2009 omnibus bill above the fiscal 2008 funding level. And many of those increases just cover inflation or are relatively small."

Earlier Tuesday, the Senate rejected, 63-32, an amendment from Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., to extend the current CR, which funds most programs at fiscal 2008 levels, through the end of fiscal 2009.

Meanwhile, Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., introduced four amendments Tuesday, including a proposal to cut 14 earmarks for clients of PMA Group, which is under investigation by the FBI for possibly steering political contributions to lawmakers through fictitious donors.

"If they're legitimate, then let them come back in this next year's bill and be done in an ethical, straightforward, above-board, transparent manner that doesn't utilize the concept of under-the-table, false campaign contributions -- allegedly," Coburn said.

Coburn introduced an amendment to require competitive bidding for projects funded in the omnibus and another to redirect $10 million out of the bill for the Justice Department to help with unsolved civil rights slayings.

Coburn's fourth amendment would eliminate 11 earmarks from the bill "that look a little stinky to me."

Among the earmarks on Coburn's hit list are $3.8 million to preserve the remnants of Tiger Stadium in Detroit, $1.9 million for the Pleasure Beach water taxi service in Connecticut, and $1.79 million for swine odor and manure management research to Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa.