Senate Restores Amtrak Aid; Bush Returns for Final Vote : Subsidy Trimmed by 10%

The Senate voted today to keep Amtrak rolling, further picking apart President Reagan’s budget.

The 53-41 vote to restore the federal Amtrak subsidy came as Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole worked privately to nail down enough support to force swift approval for a revised budget containing $300 billion in spending cuts.

The rapid-fire developments came as the Senate appeared headed for a final showdown vote on the 1986 budget.

Dole said there was a 50-50 chance of a final vote on the new budget package by this evening. Vice President George Bush cut short a speaking tour to head back to Washington to cast a tie-breaking vote if needed.

10% Cut Proposed

The Amtrak vote came on an amendment by Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.). His amendment would keep subsidies for the rail system alive, but at a 10% reduction--$616 million a year instead of the current $684-million-a-year subsidy.

Specter told the Senate that elimination of the Amtrak subsidies, as President Reagan proposed, would have killed the rail system. “The United States would be the only major industrialized nation without a national rail system,” he said.

Specter said the nation’s transportation system would break down if passenger trains went out of business. “It would be impossible to land a plane at LaGuardia or National airports (in New York and Washington) because of the clogged transportation system,” he said.

Smaller Amount Possible

Officials said Dole’s revised budget would provide far less for Amtrak than Specter proposed.

Sources said Dole’s blueprint would likely propose canceling next year’s Social Security cost-of-living increase and hold the rise in defense spending constant with inflation.

Even so, Dole was said to be willing to change both provisions in a bid to pick up Democratic support, and Sen. Lawton Chiles (D-Fla.), an opponent of the plan, said, “They’re still horse-trading.”

Sources also said Dole’s plan would resurrect most of the federal programs that President Reagan proposed killing, including the Job Corps and Urban Development Action Grants.

No Tax Increase

There would be no tax increases in the proposal, which would cut spending by roughly $50 billion next year, according to the sources, who spoke on condition they not be identified by name. In all, the plan was designed to reduce federal deficits in half over three years, to roughly $100 billion.

But by agreeing to salvage many domestic programs and scale back the Administration’s defense buildup, Dole thus jettisoned a compromise spending plan agreed to several weeks ago by Reagan.

There was no word on whether the President would embrace the new plan, although Budget Director David A. Stockman has helped draft it.

White House spokesman Larry Speakes, who was traveling with the President in Lisbon, said on the Senate budget action, “We are in the process of working toward a final package.”

Potential for Vote Shifts

Every move Dole made carried the potential for defections as well as enlistments. Paring the defense buildup to inflation levels satisfied many Pentagon critics, for example, but prompted Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) to threaten to vote against the plan.

Dole’s efforts to piece a new budget together proceeded off the Senate floor, while inside the chamber, senators sought all-but-meaningless votes on restoration of funds for their favorite domestic programs.

Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) proposed to add funding to veterans programs, but on a vote of 49 to 47, the Senate voted to table, and thus kill, the plan.

The developments signaled the apparent conclusion of a long-running budget drama in the Senate, in which Dole first won symbolic approval for the initial Reagan-backed budget, then watched while the Senate shredded it in a series of votes last week.