House, Senate Panels OK $80B War Spending Wednesday April 2, 2003 5:00 AM
WASHINGTON (AP) - The House and Senate Appropriations committees approved similar bills Tuesday containing nearly $80 billion for initial costs of the war with Iraq and other anti-terrorism efforts, including aid for the nation's struggling airlines. Both measures exceeded the $74.7 billion that President Bush requested last week for the remaining six months of the government's budget year. And both Republican-controlled panels weakened the wide latitude he had sought for spending most of the money without congressional strings, which he had argued was needed to quickly respond to the uncertainties of war. Besides paring down a near-$60 billion fund that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld would have controlled, smaller accounts to be administered by agencies like the Justice and Homeland Security departments were also dismantled or trimmed. That reflected a long-standing bipartisan legislative resentment of executive branch efforts to usurp Congress' power of the purse. ``We didn't just create huge slush funds to be used at the discretion of an agency,'' said House Appropriations Committee Chairman Bill Young, R-Fla. The overwhelming votes of approval - 59-0 in the House committee, 29-0 by the Senate panel - underscored lawmakers' desires to quickly approve the aid while U.S. troops shoot their way toward Baghdad. Bush has requested the funds by April 11, and GOP leaders hope the full House and Senate will approve initial versions of the bills this week. But a series of votes and remarks also spotlighted the pressures many lawmakers feel to increase spending for local law enforcement and emergency agencies. By a party-line 35-28, the House panel rejected a Democratic effort to add $2.5 billion to the $4.2 billion that measure contains for domestic security initiatives, the same as Bush requested. Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., said limiting the funds was necessary to avoid signaling to the states ``that there's a bottomless pit in Washington for anything labeled homeland security.'' Though Democratic senators offered no amendments to the $4.6 billion in the Senate version, they spoke of trying to add up to $9 billion when the full Senate debates the measure, perhaps beginning Wednesday. ``It is not a matter of partisan politics. It is a matter of protecting a vulnerable nation,'' said Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., of the need for more such funds. At the House panel, resentment surfaced toward countries that have hindered the U.S. war effort. Amendments were offered and defeated erasing the package's $1 billion in aid for Turkey, and barring any of the bill's $2.5 billion for Iraqi reconstruction from going to firms from countries that opposed the U.S. effort to win U.N. support for the attack on Iraq. Turkey's refusal to allow an American invasion force to be based there ``cost American and allied blood and time and money,'' said Rep. Randy Cunningham, R-Calif., who sponsored the effort to cut that country's aid. Overall, the House bill's total price tag was $77.9 billion. Senate aides still totaling their bill's cost said it approached $80 billion. With broad support from both parties, the House panel added $3.2 billion for grants for airline companies, which have lobbied heavily for aid in the wake of war and continued terrorism threats they say have hurt business. The Senate panel approved $2.7 billion for expenses including airlines' security costs, aid to airports, and extended unemployment benefits for jobless air industry workers. Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, said he believed the White House favored a far smaller package and predicted its size would shrink when House-Senate bargainers craft a compromise bill. The bulk of both bills was for the Pentagon: $62.5 billion approved by the House and $62.6 billion by the Senate, which is what Bush requested. But while Bush proposed giving the Defense Department unfettered control over $59.9 billion of those funds, the House limited his flexibility to $25.4 billion, the Senate to $11 billion. The two committees applied the rest to specific Pentagon accounts. The House bill contained the same $7.8 billion Bush proposed to rebuild Iraq and to help U.S. allies, while the Senate added $200 million. Besides Turkey, Israel, Jordan, Egypt, Afghanistan, the Philippines and other countries would receive assistance, and the House included $71.5 million for an interim U.S. diplomatic facility in postwar Iraq. The House also included $165 million for administering smallpox vaccines and compensating volunteers who get ill after taking the shot, and for research into severe acute respiratory syndrome, which is spreading in Asia and elsewhere. The Senate package included $98 million for construction costs of an agriculture research center in Ames, Iowa, that its supporters say will be a leading weapon in ensuring food safety from terrorists.
