Dole Expects Plan to End Deficits to Pass : Predicts That Filibuster Against GOP Proposal Will Be Broken

Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.), facing what he called a “test of strength” for Republican plans to pare the federal deficit, conceded Saturday that a filibuster against a GOP budget-balancing plan may last until Monday, the deadline for passing debt legislation that would keep the federal government funded.

But Dole predicted that the debt-limit extension with the budget amendment would be passed by the Senate later this week with “strong bipartisan support,” once the filibuster is broken. A few days of technical federal bankruptcy are bearable, he said, if they lead to a workable deficit-reduction plan.

Dole made his forecast amid a weekend of political maneuvering in which President Reagan and Democratic leaders again united on the importance of paring budget deficits, then split bitterly over how that should be done.

Rare Weekend Session

The Senate, lumbering through a rare weekend session, was headed toward a vote this afternoon on whether to end a Democrat-led filibuster against the budget-balancing amendment, which would order a phase-out of federal budget deficits by 1991. Republicans are trying to attach the amendment to the politically sensitive debt legislation, which raises the federal government’s borrowing authority to a record $2.078 trillion.

Unless the debt ceiling is raised by Monday, the government effectively will run out of cash and could be forced to furlough most employees and shut down many federal offices.

Reagan and top Democratic critics fired political shots Saturday for and against the budget-balancing amendment, with Reagan saying that it would curb the government’s “insatiable appetite to spend” and Democrats calling the plan dangerous and hastily conceived.

Byrd Sees ‘Monstrosity’

Senate Minority Leader Robert C. Byrd (D-W. Va.) and House Majority Whip Thomas S. Foley (D-Wash.) said that a bipartisan plan to reduce budget deficits is necessary and possible. But Byrd called the Republican amendment a “monstrosity” that would turn over vital congressional budget-cutting powers to the President.

Foley called it “unthinkable that people would assume that Congress should deal with (the amendment) in a midnight rush to beat a deadline” on the debt legislation.

Reagan, in his weekly radio address, said that the amendment would end budget deficits “without raising taxes, without jeopardizing our defenses and without breaking our commitments to Social Security” benefits, which Reagan has promised to leave untouched.

The amendment, sponsored by Sens. Warren B. Rudman (R-N. H.) and Phil Gramm (R-Tex.), would mandate annual $36-billion cuts in the current $200-billion-a-year budget deficit until Oct. 1, 1991, when the budget would be balanced.

Across-the-Board Cuts

Should Congress fail to make the reductions, the President would execute across-the-board cuts in spending--except for Social Security benefits and contracts--until the spending goal is reached.

Republicans call the plan an even-handed way to make difficult spending cuts. Democratic critics say it gives the President too much fiscal power and leaves untouched much of the Defense Department’s contract-laden budget.

Today’s vote is intended to cut off debate on the amendment and force a vote on the proposal itself, probably early this week. Dole said he expects a large Republican attendance today but said he was uncertain whether he would muster the 60 votes needed to end a filibuster.

“We’ll have the vote,” he said Saturday, but “I’m not certain we’ll get it . . . . I hope tomorrow, if cloture is not invoked, we can do it on Monday.”

Stretching Spending

A Monday vote probably could not be taken in time to pass debt-ceiling legislation before the government exceeds its borrowing authority. But Dole said that federal spending could be stretched for a few days by using overdrafting authority with banks and other fiscal dodges.

“The government will not come to a halt. It may slow down,” he said. “But my view is that the stakes are high enough.”

Democrats have pressed for a temporary two-week extension of the debt ceiling to allow time to draft a compromise deficit-reduction package. Dole said he may be willing to consider a five-day extension of borrowing authority--until Thursday. But he said that such a move would be difficult because it would require the consent of the House, which passed its own extension of federal borrowing authority this summer.