| http://www.nytimes.com/2001/07/19/politics/19SPEN.html
Bush's Budget Enforcer Defies Fiscal Conservatives in House By PHILIP SHENON 
WASHINGTON, July 18 — The Bush administration's hopes of stopping Congress from declaring budget emergencies to ignore spending caps is being threatened by a powerful Republican lawmaker who is usually one of its most reliable allies on Capitol Hill: Representative Tom DeLay of Texas, the House majority whip. Mr. DeLay, the third-ranking Republican in the House, is under pressure from Houston voters in his district to find money to help the city clean up after a huge tropical storm last month. Part of his solution is to put an additional $1.3 billion in this year's budget for the Federal Emergency Management Agency. That has startled White House officials and House colleagues who say Mr. DeLay is undermining the administration's efforts to enforce budgetary discipline on Republicans involved in writing appropriations bills. Mr. DeLay's emergency funding request would increase by one-fifth the size of a $6.5 billion bill being considered by Congress to supplement the current fiscal year's budget. The bill is supposed to handle the unanticipated budget needs of several government agencies through the end of the year. On a voice vote earlier this week, the House Appropriations Committee approved a measure by Mr. DeLay to insert the money into next year's federal budget if he was unsuccessful in finding a way to fit it into the supplemental bill for this year. Mr. DeLay, a member of the Appropriations Committee, made clear that he was prompted to request the additional money largely out of a desire to serve his constituents. "This funding ensures that Houstonians and all Americans can be confident that FEMA is prepared when tragedy strikes," he said. The emergency management agency, which has not asked for the extra money, is overseeing the cleanup from Tropical Storm Allison. The storm devastated large parts of Houston and surrounding suburbs with flooding. Many Democrats support an increase in the agency's budget, and they clearly enjoyed the spectacle of a Republican who relishes his reputation as a budget-cutting conservative standing up to the White House and demanding that more money be made available to help his district. Mr. DeLay is known among colleagues as "the hammer," in part because of his insistence on fiscal discipline among House Republicans. "Mr. DeLay is doing a modern-day version of St. Paul's conversion on the road to Damascus, saying we need more money rather than less," said Representative David R. Obey of Wisconsin, the ranking Democrat on the Appropriations Committee. "He is just confirming what we have said from the beginning: that the Republican budget is totally unrealistic." A House Republican, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Mr. DeLay's Republican colleagues were "dumbfounded" by his move. "This makes it much more difficult to maintain discipline on other issues," the lawmaker said. White House and House Republican officials said they were blindsided by Mr. DeLay's request, which they said undermined an aggressive campaign by President Bush and his budget director, Mitchell E. Daniels Jr., to prevent House Republicans from trying to push money for hometown projects into appropriations bills. White House officials walked on rhetorical eggshells in criticizing Mr. DeLay's request while trying not to antagonize Mr. DeLay, whose support is vital to the White House on virtually every major policy issue before Congress. "We know of the congressman's keen interest on this," said Chris Ullman, a spokesman for the White House budget office. "But we believe FEMA has adequate resources for the current fiscal year. We believe no more funding should be added to the supplemental." |
